


The Sound of Silence

by Thisoneiswell



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anxiety Attacks, Awkward Romance, Depression, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/M, First Kiss, First Love, First Meetings, First Time, Fluff and Smut, Friends to Lovers, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Loss of Virginity, Mental Health Issues, My First Fanfic, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2020-06-24 10:07:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 13
Words: 59,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19721494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thisoneiswell/pseuds/Thisoneiswell
Summary: Falco Grice never liked change. That is until his best friend introduces him to his girlfriend's roommate a energetic girl called Gabi Braun. The two hit it off becoming friends, even potentially more. But what Falco doesn't know is that Gabi hides deep scars within her soul that threaten to destroy them both.





	1. In which Falco meets someone new

**Author's Note:**

> Okay. This is my first fanfiction ever so I'm not sure how good this is going to be. I still think this turned out all right though. I couldn't help but notice that there aren't a lot of Gabi/Falco stories out there and because these two are probably my favorite characters of the series, I decided to rectify that. I'm not sure how often I'll update, but I'll try to do it as much as possible. Anyway, enjoy.

It’s funny how, when you get right down to it, life is just one long routine. You get up, go to work, work at least eight hours every day, and then come home and then do whatever it is you like to do be it reading, or watching whatever TV shows you like, or playing video games with yourself, or with a friend. You never really do anything different, save for an annual vacation or an unexpected accident. 

That was pretty much Falco Grice’s existence. He got up at around eight o clock, had a quick breakfast of cornflakes and toast, went on a brief morning jog, and then went to his classes at ten. After school, he would go to work at the local supermarket, spend all day stocking shelves, and listening to customers complaining about anything and everything, then he would come home and do whatever homework he had, and then he would either play Halo or watch Gotham with his roommate.

Today, however, he and his roommate and childhood best friend Udo had decided to spend the afternoon studying with Udo’s girlfriend Zophia over at her apartment instead of lying on the couch going over their notes as usual. 

“So where does Zophia live again?” Falco asked.

“Just on the other side of campus that’s all,” Udo replied. 

The two had left their shared apartment five minutes ago, and Falco had been a little confused as to where they were going. It wasn’t too bad of a walk though. It had been fairly nice that day, so they didn’t have to bundle up or anything. They quickly made their way through the throngs of students heading to their classes or to their homes. 

Falco and Udo’s school wasn’t the largest of schools. Located in the town of Liberio in southeastern Colorado, Marley University only boasted five hundred students. Sometimes it felt more like a community college than a university, but its tuition rates were manageable and it was relatively close to their homes. Most students in that region went there so that they wouldn’t have to move to Ft. Collins or Boulder to go to CSU or Colorado University. 

Upon arriving at Zophia’s apartment complex, located just outside of the school’s campus, the two took a quick elevator ride up to the fifth floor, and walked down the hall till Udo indicated that they had arrived. 

“So this is it?” Falco asked

“Yup here we are,” Udo said. 

Udo knocked on the door, and after a few moments the door opened. 

“Hey guys” Zophia said as she opened the door.

“Hey Zoph” Udo replied. 

Zophia chuckled and moved in to start kissing him leaving Falco a bit weirded out. The couple made out for a few moments before they remembered that Falco was there and stopped. Zophia then turned ad gave Falco a big hug and a quick kiss on the cheek. 

“There’s my backup boyfriend” Zophia said. It was a joke that they had that if Udo and Zophia ever broke up, Zophia would start dating Falco. 

“Hey Zoph,” Falco said,” I haven’t seen you in a while.”

“Well you never really come over do you,” Zophia said, “If I didn’t know any better I’d say you where avoiding me.”

It wasn’t that he was avoiding her or anything. He liked Zophia quite a bit and was glad that she made Udo so happy. It was just that the two were getting a little obnoxious with their relationship. 

Falco and Udo had never been in any sort of relationship before. No girl in their high school had wanted to go out with a quiet, dorky kid, or with a strange, Polish kid whose English was still shaky and who brought odd looking meals for lunch. The boys famously spent their senior prom night playing video games in Falco’s living room while all the other kids were out drinking and dancing. 

Falco had expected to go through college the same way. Until Udo met Zophia that is, they sat next to each other in one of their classes, and they kind of hit it off. Falco had initially been quite pleased that Udo had found someone, even if he was still a single, virgin. That is until the gross stuff started happening. 

Once Udo and Zophia got more comfortable being together, it seemed like they couldn’t keep their hands off each other. It had started out simple enough with hand holding in public. Then they started making out anytime they saw each other no matter who was around to see (that usually being Falco). 

One night, however, Udo didn’t come back from a date with Zophia at all that night. When morning came and Udo still wasn’t back, Falco considered calling the police. Before he could do so, Udo came in. Upon questioning, Udo explained that after dinner he and Zophia had gone back to her place. Her roommate had been out so they had the place to themselves. They had started making out and things slowly progressed until they found themselves on her bed in her room. Basically, they had sex for the first time that night, and Udo didn’t leave until morning. Udo was kind enough to give Falco details as to what sex had been like as Falco, while he was grossed out, was a little curious. 

After that, it seemed like they had sex almost all the time. Udo would often come home with his shirts inside out, and with hickies on his neck. Things weren’t to annoying, until one day Falco came home from work to find Zophia in Udo’s bed on her knees with her pants down, and Udo was hunched over her ramming into her at full speed. Falco had stared at them for a few moments before quickly walking out to go anywhere else. But what really killed him was when they would keep him up all night with the sound of their lovemaking. 

“Yo seriously,” Udo said, “You’re supposed to be my girlfriend.” 

“Well it’s not Falco’s fault that he’s much sweeter than you,” Zophia replied. 

“Yeah well, he may be nicer than me, but he doesn’t have an awesome girlfriend like you” he said wrapping his arms around her waist. 

“Yet” she replied giving him a quick kiss leaving Falco puzzled as to what she meant. 

After they went inside, Zophia said, “Okay my roommate is going to be joining us when she comes back which should be any minute now.”

“That’s cool, I don’t think that Falco has met Gabi yet have you Falco?” 

“Uh no I don’t think so,” Falco replied as he sat down on the sofa. 

“Oh well I think you’ll like her,” Zophia said, “She’s been my friend since we were six years old. She’s always been a great friend to me, kind, supportive, always standing up for me, and she always…”

SLAM!!! Falco heard the door open and shut, and a raven haired girl wearing what looked like a Starbucks uniform and a very beat up black overcoat with her hair tied up in a messy bun strolled in. 

“I’m home and I swear to God, you’d better not be sucking face with your fucking boyfriend you bitch.” The girl, who Falco assumed was Gabi, hollered at the top of her lungs. 

“You know Gabi, I don’t appreciate you calling my boyfriend and I names,” Zophia said with an amused tone in her voice. 

“Yeah well, deal with it; I am not sleeping on the couch again tonight, because it’s hard to sleep when your roommate and her boyfriend are fucking in the bed next to you.” 

“You’re just jealous because we get more action in a week than you have had in your entire life.” Udo laughed. 

Gabi responded to those remarks by wrapping her arms around Udo and Zophia’s necks and started choking them. 

“You two are the grossest pair of fucking assholes that I have ever met, and that’s not even…”

“Um Gabi, we have a guest you know.” Zophia choked out.

“Huh?” Gabi turned to the couch where Falco had been quietly watching the spectacle.

“Oh, I see.” She said letting go of Udo and Zophia’s necks making them fall on the floor. 

“You really are a devil aren’t you?” Udo wheezed. 

Walking over to Falco, Gabi raised her hand and said,” Hi, I’m Gabi, Gabi Braun. You must be Udo’s friend.” 

Falco shook her hand. She had a really strong grip, and her hand was greasy from what he assumed was sweat. 

“Falco, Falco Grice. Nice to meet you.” 

“Likewise.” She said. 

Gabi walked past Udo and Zophia’s still recovering forms and said.” Okay, I’m going to get changed, and then we can get this show on the road.” 

She then slipped into her bedroom closing the door behind her. Udo and Zophia helped each other up, and Zophia smiled at Falco and said. “See isn’t she great.” Falco wasn’t sure if she was being sarcastic or if she was really serious. A few minutes later, Gabi emerged from her room having changed into a plain, white T-shirt and a pair of jeans, though she still wore the black jacket, and said.” Okay let’s get started shall we.” 

The four of them spent the next few hours huddled around the small coffee table the girls had in their living room while going over their notes and textbooks. As time went on, however, Udo and Zophia slowly started grinding on each other. Eventually, the two lovebirds got up, hand in hand, and led each other to Zophia’s room. When they closed the door, Zophia whispered in Udo’s ear.” Do you think it’s going to work?” 

“Maybe,” Udo replied. “We’ll see if he takes to her or not.” 

“Yeah,” Zophia quietly said. “I just think it would be nice if Gabi and Falco had someone the way we have each other.”

“I know, it’d be great if Falco actually got out of his shell ya’know. I mean, He’s never even kissed a girl. Of course I hadn’t before I met you though.” 

” Well, I’m happy I could help with that.” Zophia chuckled,

“So, where were we?” Udo said as he moved his hands underneath Zophia’s shirt. 

Meanwhile, Gabi and Falco had been abruptly left alone in the living room. It was somewhat awkward since the two had only met a few hours ago, and they were only friends of friends. Gabi got up and went to the fridge, pulled out two Dr Peppers for her and Falco, and abruptly plopped down on the couch a little to close to Falco for his liking. They then sat in awkward silence for a bit, listening to the sound of the mattress creaking in the other room. 

“Ugh, those two can’t hold it in their pants for a few hours.” Gabi said. 

“Yeah, I know right, I mean it was fine at first, but now it’s getting pretty obnoxious isn’t it. By the way, do they keep you up at night too?” Falco asked. 

“Oh hell yeah,” Gabi replied. “We share a room so I get to hear every detail of what’s going on; till eventually I just get up and sleep on the couch. Not that it matters, because I can still hear them from out hear as you can see.”

“That really sucks, I mean, at least Udo and I have different rooms so it’s not as bad as that but still.”

“I hear you, don’t get me wrong, I love the hell out of Zophia, but I swear to God I’m going to kill her one of these days. 

“Yeah, right.” Falco said remembering the spectacle he saw when he first met Gabi. 

“Hey, if you were thinking about what you saw earlier, I didn’t actually mean any of what I said to them, I was just playing around.” Gabi said somewhat sheepishly. 

“I figured that you weren’t doing anything that they weren’t okay with so it’s fine I guess.” Falco said. 

“Okay. We cool” 

“Cool”

They sat there in silence for a few moments before Gabi asked.” So what are you in school for?” 

“I’m currently studying to be an architect.” Falco replied. 

“Cool. What does that involve?” 

“A lot of math, geometry mainly. It can get really confusing sometimes but I like to think that I manage. What about you, what are you studying for?”

“Radiology, I’m trying to get my certificate, and then I’ll see if there are any openings around here. If not, I’ll probably end up moving to Florida where there’s a lot of demand for medical practitioners I guess. 

“Huh, sounds interesting.” 

A few minutes later Gabi got up to throw away the soda cans that they had finished. When she came back she sat down on the couch, put her elbow on the top of the couch, rested her head against it, and sat there for a few moments before asking,” So where do you work at?” 

Falco leaned back on the arm of the couch and replied, “I work over at a local grocery store.” 

“Oh really, Do you work over at the Albertsons just off campus? Because I’m sure I would have seen you-“

“No, I work at the Safeway on Helios Street. Why do work at Albertsons or something?”

Gabi chuckled, “No I work at a Starbucks inside Albertsons. Didn’t you notice my uniform when I walked in dumb dumb.” She leaned in and gave him a couple taps on the head causing Falco to recoil. 

“Oh yeah, I guess I forgot about that.” Falco said rubbing his head. 

“It’s a pretty decent job. The pay’s good, they work around my hours, and I really like my boss. It’s just that some customers suck, and I have this one lady who works there who’s always on my ass about shit. 

Falco laughed and said, “Let me guess, she can’t stand the fact that you don’t want to hear about how miserable her life is, and she hates the fact that you don’t share the deep intimate details of your sex life with her.” 

Gabi’s jaw dropped a little and she said,” Um yes, that’s basically it. You have the same problem or something?” 

“Yeah, there’s this girl who works with me, Hitch her name is, she’s like always badgering me about why I don’t talk too much, or why I don’t go out and party at night, or why I’m actually working when I’m at work instead of being glued to my phone. She really doesn’t understand why I’ve never had sex before. Hell, she couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that Udo and I spent our prom night playing video games in my room.” 

“Well guess what bitch!” Gabi laughed, “That’s why Falco here is a successful college student and you got pregnant at age 16 and have to work two jobs to support you’re kids.” 

“Well she doesn’t have any kids that I know of.” 

“Oh really, I was just joking. Though that’s the sad case I’ve heard from a lot of coworkers. Really makes me glad I’ve never been out with anyone before. And as for the whole you being quiet thing, there’s nothing wrong with that.” 

Taken a little aback, Falco stammered, “Oh, you really think so. I mean, not to many people seem to think that, I guess they think that I’m a weirdo, or that I’m just rude or something.” 

“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with being quiet. I kind of noticed it when I met you, but I figured, ‘Hey if you don’t want to talk, you don’t want to talk’ It didn’t bother me any. Besides, I wish more people would be like you anyway. I mean, so many people want to be the center of attention these days because it makes them feel better about themselves, but someone once told me that some of the best people in history are the ones who knew when to sit and listen. Granted, I’m not one of those people, but you seem like you could be one of them.” 

Falco smiled and said, “Well I’m glad you feel that way, it’s just that-“ 

The door to the bedroom opened, and Udo and Zophia came out giggling. 

“Jesus Christ, you to have been at it for how long now!” Gabi exclaimed. 

“Up yours Gabi.” Zophia said 

“Hey Falco, we should probably get going.” Udo said to his friend. 

“Yeah, I guess we should.” Falco said slowly getting off the couch and going over to the coat rack to get his coat. 

“Hey, you should come over more often Falco.” Zophia said. 

“Yeah I should.” Falco said. He turned to Gabi and said, “Hey it was nice meeting you.” 

“Likewise.” Gabi replied. “We should do this again sometime.” 

“Sounds like fun.” Falco said. 

“Yeah, see you around I guess. 

“Bye” 

After the boys had stepped out Udo turned to Falco and asked,” So what did you think of Gabi?” 

Falco shrugged and said,” She seemed nice enough I guess.” 

“Yeah I know she takes a little getting used to but she’s pretty cool. She was very protective of Zophia when we first started dating, but she warmed up to me eventually.” 

Falco laughed at that and said,” sounds like her. 

“Yeah, hey maybe we should all start hanging out, the four of us. I mean wouldn’t it be nice to have some more people to hang out with.” 

Falco thought about it for a minute and said, “I guess that would be fun. It would be nice to hang out with the girls sometimes.’ 

“Sweet, I’ll talk to Zophia about bringing Gabi to hang out with us more. God knows we could use some more fun in our lives.” 

“Sounds good I guess.” Falco said. 

Falco usually didn’t like change in his life he thought to himself. But who knows, maybe this one would be a welcome one.


	2. In Which Gabi Has a Bad Day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I finally got this up. I read 119, and holy crap Falco. I knew this would happen, but it still sucked. I thought his titan would be a 3 or 4 meter class and it would look cuter though. And by the way, go Gabi!!! It was pretty satisfying seeing her blow Eren's head off because he's been a jerk for a while now. anyway, enjoy this chapter.

_His arms were wrapped around her in one of the many hugs he had given her in her life. This one was different though, this hug wasn't filled with the joy and happiness he had always given her; this hug reeked of pain and sorrow._

_She had seen this scene night after night; she knew what came next._

_"You know, you are the only person in my life who's ever really cared about me. I'm so sorry."_

_BANG!!! The shot rang out. She didn't want to look, because she knew what she would see. But as always, her vision turned up to look at the bloody spectacle that was his head. There was a hole in the top of his skull; his brains splattered all over the couch with his mouth hanging wide open. The worst part of it all was his eyes. His once life like eyes, filled with vigor and confidence, were rolled back into his skull to the point were she could barely see his pupils._

_She felt something warm on her face. She reached up to touch it, and realized that it was his blood. She then looked down at her hands, and saw that they were covered in blood and what appeared to be part of his brains._

_She could hear them around her, the devils. She couldn't see them as always, but she knew that they were there. Slowly approaching her, laughing at her, trying to destroy everything she cared about._

_Amidst all this, she opened her mouth to scream..._

Gabi awoke gasping for air, her pajamas soaked in sweat. She frantically looked around and trying to register where she was, and then she remembered; she was in her bedroom in her apartment. She was safe.

She glanced over at her alarm clock which read 7:34 A.M. She laid her head back on her pillow and closed her eyes trying to rest a bit more. She tried to rest for about ten minutes before she kicked of her covers, and decided just to start the day even though she didn’t have to be at work until ten that morning.

She went into the small bathroom at the end of the hall, turned on the shower, and undressed while she waited for the water to get warm. Once inside the shower, she leaned her head against her arms on the shower wall, letting the water run off her bare back.

“There are no devils,” she said, “There are no devils,” she repeated as she wiped tears out of her eyes.

“It’s all in your head.” She mumbled, “It’s all in your head.”

After she got out, she dried off, wrapped herself in a towel and went back to her room to get changed. She put on her work uniform, just to save herself the time of having to change into it later, brushed her hair, and arranged it in the messy bun she always wore.  
When Gabi entered the kitchen, she found Zophia making her breakfast.

“Morning,” Zophia greeted.

“Morning,” Gabi mumbled.

“Are you okay?” Zophia asked, giving her a somewhat concerned look.

“Yeah, I’m good,” Gabi replied, smiling somewhat insincerely.

Zophia, knowing she was lying, only nodded and turned back to her eggs.

Gabi sat down at the table, and poured herself a bowl of cereal. Zophia joined her shortly and the two girls at in silence for a bit.

“So you’re working at ten right,” Zophia asked.

“Yeah, what are you working?”

“Oh pretty quickly so I got to get going soon. By the way, Udo works tonight so it’s going to be you and me tonight.”

“Sounds cool,”

“I might be a little late getting home, I have to go pick up some, uh, stuff.”

Gabi laughed and said,” You know, marijuana is legal in Colorado so you don’t have to get all secretive about it.”

“Oh, shut up, don’t think that you’re not going to join me later Gabi.”

Gabi laughed and gave her some money from her wallet.

“Here. I’ll pitch in too, just so that you can’t say that I’m mooching all of your weed.”

Zophia chuckled as she took the money. The two weren’t the biggest stoners; it was just something they decided to experiment with when they first went to college. And since weed was legal in Colorado, they didn’t have to worry about having their reputations ruined or anything like that.

Zophia stood up and said, “Well, I’ve got to go here.”

“Okay, see ya.”

“See ya.” And Zophia walked out the door for a fun filled day of waiting tables at a local IHOP, leaving Gabi by herself.

After cleaning up the breakfast dishes, Gabi made herself a cup of tea and sat down on the same couch she had sat on with Falco last night. She blew some steam off her tea letting it cool off and just sat there resting for the day to come. She looked through some of the magazines they had lying around, which were mostly garbage, before she just got up and selected a book to read. She read for a while until she checked her phone and realized that it was time to go. Sighing, she got up, grabbed her purse, and made sure to lock the door behind her before she left.

It was a short walk to work. The Albertsons her Starbucks was in was only five minutes from where she lived. She walked in silence as there was no one about because it was Saturday, and all the students were either working themselves, or they were recovering from being hung over. That was fine though, as Gabi didn’t feel like talking to anyone anyway. Nights like last night left her like that meaning it was going to be interesting dealing with customers today.

Gabi walked into Albertsons weaving her way through customers till she found herself at the small Starbucks located near the front of the store. She groaned when she saw who she would be working with today.

Jane was what you would call, a major pain in the ass. She was at least sixty years old, pretty overweight, and had what could be summed up as a serious attitude problem. What sucked the most though, was that Gabi was convinced that Jane hated her guts. Gabi was certain of this, because of the dirty looks Jane gave her whenever she walked by, the fact that Jane would openly refuse to do anything Gabi asked of her, no matter how nicely she asked or how urgently they needed it, and, of course, the fact that Jane had bluntly told her, on many occasions, that she didn’t like her.

You see, back when she first started, Gabi had committed a most grievous offense against Jane from which Gabi could never be forgiven. Of course, Gabi was still trying to figure out just what that offence had been. It may have been the fact that Jane, who had a somewhat vulgar sense of humor, had once made a joke that involved a suicide, and Gabi hadn’t laughed at it because quite frankly, Gabi did not find suicide funny at all. Suicide, in her opinion, was a horrible thing that she had experienced to much of in her life, and she couldn’t tolerate anyone joking about it. Not that Jane understood that, leading to the tense situation Gabi was in right now.

“Morning,” Gabi greeted a forced smile.

All Gabi got in response was a grunt and a nasty glare. Giving Jane another fake smile, Gabi made her way to the office where she hung up her jacket, put on her hat, and prepared for another fun filled day at work.

Gabi knew she had to be careful what she said to Jane today, because Jane seemed to be in a worse mood than usual today.

“The closers did not do anything last night.” Jane snarled as Gabi walked in.

“Really,” Gabi replied.

“Nothing is stocked, the floor still had crumbs on it, and you see this,” holding up a coffee pot, “There are smudges on this pot. All because Flagon is to busy trying to get out of here rather than doing his job!”

“Hmm wow,” Gabi flatly remarked knowing that the closers had quite a bit to do other than make sure that Jane had a few extra stacks of coffee cups so that she wouldn’t have to take a few extra minutes to grab them herself. As for the smudges, the pot itself was plenty clean; Jane just had a nasty case of OCD. Despite being such a small store, Gabi’s store tended to have a pretty difficult closing based on the massive dinner rushes they had due to students getting out of school and wanting coffee. Gabi, having worked both openings and closings, knew that the closers had it much worse than the openers.

“I’ve tried talking to Mike about it, but he’s to busy playing buddy, buddy with his favorites, like you, and it’s not fair to me that I have to do everything around here, while everyone else jacks around all day.

Truth being told, Jane only assembled and took orders, and occasionally stocked something while Gabi did everything that Jane was supposed to be doing.

“That sucks,” Gabi blankly stated.

Jane glared and snarled at Gabi for not showing enough apathy for her perceived plight.

“You’re going to be on register today.” Jane grunted.

“Okay,” Gabi replied, even though she knew that Jane was supposed to be taking orders and she was supposed to be making them, because Gabi was pretty fast at assembly and Jane moved like a fucking turtle at assembly.

“You know, I have had it with your fucking attitude, and when I talk to Mike today, it’s going to stop.

And with that Jane stormed in the back presumably to check her phone as she seemed to do every ten minutes.

“Sounds good; you fucking bitch.” Gabi mumbled under her breath.

Gabi looked around the store to discover that Jane hadn’t gotten anything ready for the day. When confronted, Jane just replied that she had been to busy to do anything as she was by herself that morning. Gabi mentally noted that even when she was by herself, she was still capable of doing more than this even when it was busy. Moaning, Gabi started brewing a pot of coffee before lunch rush hit. Basically, every time Gabi started prepping something, Jane would get angry and insist that she was going to do it eventually.

“ _Well we kind of need it now, or else we're going to be screwed for lunch, you fucking bitch_.” Gabi would think every time Jane snapped at her, but didn’t say out loud.

An hour later, Mike Zacharias, the store’s general manager came in. Gabi liked Mike, because he never got angry about anything, and he seemed to like her. Mike could be a bit weird though mainly because he claimed that he could tell good employees from bad ones by smelling them making job interviews pretty strange.

“Morning,” Gabi greeted Mike.

“Morning Gabi,” Mike greeted back.

Mike walked toward the office and Jane moved to intercept him. “What are you angry at me for now Jane?” he asked.

Gabi wiped down some of the tables as she indirectly listened to Jane bitching about Mike about how horrible everyone she didn’t like was, and how everyone she didn’t like should be fired, and how if she was running things everything would better. Gabi knew the only reason that Mike put up with Jane’s crap was because they were a bit shorthanded being such a small store. Of course, once they got some more people that would be a different matter entirely; so Gabi was hopeful that day would come soon.

The lunch rush was hell. It was Saturday, so it was naturally busy, and they were the closest Starbucks to campus so students came pouring in to shop, and pick up some sort of coffee. Jane kept screwing up orders forcing Gabi to go back and correct her leading to Jane getting mad at her. Most customers were nice, but there were a few who drove Gabi completely insane.

CUSTOMER 1: “Do you have coffee, without caffeine in it?”

“Yes we have decafe coffee. Is that what’d you’d like?” Gabi replied.

“No, I don’t want decafe coffee. I want coffee without caffeine in it.”

Gabi gave him a bewildered stare, her jaw hanging slightly open.

CUSTOMER 2: “Uh I would like, um I would like one, I would like, give me a minute here.”

“Of course take your time sir.” Gabi replied, trying to hold back frustration as this guy had been ordering for over ten minutes and still hadn’t made up his mind what he wanted; leading to multiple customers walking away.

“I’ll have one caramel frappe with no whipped cream and; no wait, I change my mind.”

It was all Gabi could do to keep herself from screaming.

CUSTOMER 3: “I’ll have one vanilla iced coffee with light ice please.”

“Of course sir, that’ll be 4.36$ please.”

The man handed Gabi the money, however, he was standing at least three feet away from the counter making it difficult for Gabi to take his money. Sighing, Gabi had to place her stomach on the counter, and try to reach across to take the payment. However, at the last second, the man turned to reply to someone telling him that she couldn’t reach the money; leading to him pulling away his hand right as Gabi was about to grab it causing her to slide off the counter onto the floor, bashing her chin on the hard tile. To his credit, the man did spend the next five minutes apologizing.

CUSTOMER 4: “HEY, I ASKED FOR FRESH COFFEE. DOES THIS LOOK FRESH TO YOU?”

Gabi moved her head away from the screaming man as she tried to calm him down.

“I’m so sorry sir I’ll brew you a fresh pot right away.” He was right though; Jane had used coffee that had gone cold. So Gabi pulled coffee that had been just brewed, ignoring Jane’s angry protests, and gave it to the man hoping it would make him happy. It didn’t.

“THIS COFFEE’S SO HOT I NEARLY BURNED MY LIPS OFF! IS THAT WHAT YOU CALL GOOD CUSTOMER SERVICE?”

“I’m sorry sir, you asked for fresh; so I gave you the freshest pot so it was bound to be a little hot…”

“OH YOU KNOW WHAT, FORGET IT.” He said. And as he walked away, he slammed his coffee into the trash can so hard that he spilled coffee all over the floor.

Gabi sighed as he walked away and went out from behind the counter to clean up the spill. She got a mop from the storage closet, and set about cleaning up the spill. She was almost done when a voice asked her.” rough day I presume?”

Gabi smiled, knowing who it was. Dot Pixis was a regular customer, and one of the few she liked.

“Oh you know, the usual,” she chuckled. She put the mop back in the closet, went back to the counter and said, “I’ll get you your usual.” Which was just a simple cup of black coffee.

Pixis chuckled and said, “Ah you know me my dear.”

“Here you go,” Gabi said, handing him his coffee.

“May I ask what happened there?” Pixis asked pointing to the bruise on her chin.

“It’s a long story.” Gabi replied.

“I certainly hope that some man hasn’t been mistreating a lovely lady such as you.”

“What! No, it’s not that; I mean I’ve never even dated any body in my life, and I have no intention of changing that.”

“Well that’s a shame. Any boy would be privileged to court you. In my day you would be married to someone right now. You really should try to find someone other wise, you’ll be lonely in you’re later years.

Gabi sighed and said, “Well unfortunately for me, most of the boys my age are total dickheads. So unless I get into older guys, or wait for the next generation to grow up I’m looking at being single forever.”

Pixis laughed and said, “Oh don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll find someone eventually, you just need to…”

“Don’t you have better things to do than hang out with your sugar daddy” Jane yelled from the kitchen.

“Ugh, I swear to God,” Gabi mumbled under her breath. “Hey I gotta go now have a good day okay.”

“You to Gabi,” Pixis replied, and with that he took out his newspaper and sat down on a small table in a corner.

Twenty minutes later, Nanaba, the assistant manager, came in.

“Hey Gabi,” Nanaba greeted, tucking in her shirt as she did so.

“Hey Nanaba,” Gabi greeted back.

“How’s Jane today?” Nanaba asked.

“Uh…”

“Right, well today’s going to pleasant.”

Nanaba went in the back, and soon enough, Gabi could here her arguing with Jane about which duties belonged to closers and which belonged to openers. Fortunately, Jane stormed out afterwards leaving Gabi to clean up the mess she had made of the kitchen. Gabi heard Mike and Nanaba in the office discussing Jane’s attitude. Nanaba seemed to think they should at least suspend her for refusing to respect Mike’s authority, and Mike agreed, except that they were short staffed and they needed people. Nanaba did acknowledge that Jane had some nasty personal problems, but it still was no excuse to act like this at work.

Gabi always suspected that Jane had all sorts of personal problems (based on the fact that Jane had told her about them even though Gabi had no interest in knowing them). Gabi figured that she would be a bitch to if she were on her third husband, who was probably cheating on her for a younger woman; had a son in prison; and was forbidden to see some of her grandchildren (though Gabi couldn’t imagine why). All in all, Gabi would feel very sorry for Jane, if she weren’t such a bitch.

The rest of Gabi’s day was pretty routine. She took orders’ made orders, and cleaned up in between. She didn’t even notice it was six o’clock until Flagon, the closing manager, came in.

“Hey Gabi, how’s it been today?”

Gabi shrugged and said, “Oh, pretty steady, the usual.”

“Yeah, hey are you okay?” pointing to the bruise on her chin.

“It’s fine. It’s a long story.”

“Huh, well if you’re off at six, I guess just check with Nanaba if you’re good to go.” He said while taking a sip of his energy drink.

“Sounds good.” She said.

After Gabi swept and mopped the floor, she was good to go. She went to the back, grabbed her jacket, and left.

As she walked home, Gabi thought about what Pixis had said. While yes she didn’t want to be alone forever, she wasn’t interested in having a relationship. After all, she had gotten to a point in her life where she was finally happy, and she didn’t want to screw that up by having to deal with a relationship going sour

Besides, what guys did she really know other than Udo. “ _Well that's not true_ ,” She thought to herself. “ _I do know Udo's friend now. What's his name again, Falco, huh, I wonder if that's his real name?"_

Even so, Gabi wasn’t interested in dating Falco anyway.

Upon getting home, Gabi shut the door, threw her purse on the counter, slowly walked over to the fridge, pulled out a Dr Pepper, and collapsed onto the couch. She leaned back and closed her eyes as she was so very tired.

She felt herself slowly dozing off, feeling the sweet lull of sleep coming for her. She let herself drift away trying to let the stress of the day roll off her.

“ _You know, you're the only person who's ever really cared about me. I'm so sorry.  
_

_BANG!!! Blood was everywhere, on the couch,on her hands, in her face, and the devils were getting closer than before; to the point where she could their breath on her head. And then she felt a claw on her shoulder._

Gabi shot up wheezing for air. She looked at her phone; half an hour had passed. She must’ve fallen asleep.

“Dammit, Dammit!” She exclaimed. “There are no devils, there are no devils. It’s all in your head.” That’s what Ms. Ral had told her. Why was she having these nightmares all of a sudden; why couldn’t she ever be happy?

After collecting herself, Gabi went to her room and changed into some running cloths. She had become something of a fitness freak in an attempt to not get fat like Jane when she got older. Jogging had always one of her favorite workouts, as it helped her relieve stress as well. Taking a deep breath as she stepped out of her apartment, she silently hoped that tomorrow would be better than today.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave comments below.


	3. In Which Falco also Has a Bad Day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I'm back, sorry about the wait but here's another chapter. Thank you for the positive comments by the way, they keep me going.

When Falco was younger, Dilbert was always his least favorite comic strip. He had always preferred other comics like Peanuts, and Garfield being his particular favorite. But now that he was nineteen, and he had started working, Dilbert had become one of his favorite comic strips of all time. The one that he was thinking about now was the one where all of Dilbert’s coworkers draw straws to determine who was going to kill this one coworker that they hated, just like Falco was considering now. 

Falco had just restocked half the shelves in one of the aisles in the Safeway he worked at, and Hitch had barely started on hers; meaning that he was going to have to go back and do what she hadn’t or else it wouldn’t get done. She was just standing there; eyes glued to her phone, putting maybe one can of tomato soup per minute on the shelf. He couldn’t figure out what was so interesting on that phone of hers that she was on it all day when she should’ve been working, but at least she wasn’t talking to him; because when she did she was usually…

“Hey Falco,” 

Crap, there she went. She stopped her texting, and the minimal work she was doing, and came over and said to him, “You know, we’ve been here for over an hour, and you haven’t said anything to me; it’s like you’re really anti-social or something.” 

“Sorry,” Falco mumbled, he wasn’t much of a talker outside of his friends and family, and when he did talk to other people it was generally job related, and never related to his personal life. Not that Hitch understood that since she shared every little detail of her life with whoever would listen. She could go on for hours about who she had dated in high school, how wasted she had got the night before, and who she hooked up with because of getting wasted. Since Falco came from a very Christian family, stuff like that only made him uncomfortable leading to him giving her short, one word answers making Hitch conclude that he was anti- social, which he wasn’t. 

Hitch sighed, shook her head, and said, “It’s sad that you’re so weird, because you’re actually kind of cute, someone I wouldn’t mind hooking up with. I mean, I kind of figured that at least one girl in your life must of offered to suck your dick at one point. Of course knowing you, you would just run away scared, or mumble out some one word response as usual.” 

Hitch chuckled and said, “You know, I actually considered inviting you over to my place as a prelude for sex once. I figured that since you were somewhat good looking it couldn’t hurt to see if you were any good in bed. And I thought that since I’m hot as fuck and your chances of getting a girlfriend is pretty low, that you would leap at a chance to get inside my pants. But then I thought that you wouldn’t want your first time to be a pity fuck, which is all it would be, and I thought that you would get all clingy afterwards and expect us to be in a relationship or something. Worst case scenario, I thought that you would ask me to marry you after the deed.” 

Falco considered what she just told him, sighed and said, “Huh, that’s nice,” 

Hitch sighed, shook her head again, and said, “Really, all that, and that’s all you have to say. God, you are weird.” 

Truth was, Falco was not interested in Hitch at all. She was pretty of course, but Falco looked for other qualities in women other than their looks. If Falco was ever going to be in a relationship, he wanted a girl who was kind, caring, with a strong, loving heart, and yes was somewhat good-looking. As for sex, Falco didn’t want his first time to be a one night fling that both parties would forget about in the morning. Falco’s parents had always told him to wait for marriage before sex. While Falco wasn’t entirely on board with that, after all, his brother, Colt, hadn’t waited before he hooked up with one of his girlfriends; He still wanted his first time to be something meaningful with someone special. Hitch, however, wasn’t quite what he was looking for, with her lazy attitude, and rude behavior. 

Besides, he knew that Hitch had hooked up with several guys in the store, and he didn’t want to be just another statistic in Hitch’s book. Hell, He had once caught Hitch and Boris having some very, aggressive sex on one of the tables in the break room. Needless to say, Falco never ate on that table again. 

“Do I even want to know what you’re bothering Falco about now?” Marlowe asked as he walked up to them.

“Oh, I was just giving poor Falco here some advice on getting a girlfriend that’s all.” Hitch replied. 

“Hmm, right, listen Falco, Levi wants to see you, says it’s urgent.” 

“Okay, I’ll be right there,” Falco said, putting down a box he was holding. As Falco walked away, he could hear Marlowe arguing with Hitch about what little work she had done. 

Levi was the assistant manager of the store, just one rank below Erwin Smith the general manager. Falco knew for a fact that Levi was a neat freak probably due to his OCD, which meant that whatever Levi wanted to talk to him about had to be some sort of cleaning task. 

“Oi, Falco over here,” Levi called from the back of the store. 

Falco hurried over to where Levi was standing and asked, “What do you need Levi?” 

“We have a fucking, grade-A emergency in the men’s bathroom.” Levi said. 

“Um, okay, what’s the problem?” Falco asked. 

Levi led him towards the men’s room and said, “Okay brace yourself, because you won’t believe this. I walked in one of the stalls to take a shit that I’ve been holding in all day, and I just happened to discover that some stupid motherfucker missed the toilet.” 

“Um, okay, that shouldn’t be too hard to…” 

“I wasn’t finished, brat.” Levi cut in. Levi took a deep breath and continued, “This piece of shit missed the toilet, while he was doing number two.” 

Falco stopped moving for a second to take in what Levi had just told him. After a few moments of being completely speechless, he found his voice and asked, “Wait, how did he… I mean… how is that even possible?” 

Levi shrugged and said, “Your guess is as good as mine. I’m guessing that his parents never toilet trained him, and he’s been wearing fucking diapers until recently. I don’t know. All I do know is that you’re the only person in this fucking store that I trust to clean up that fucking mess, now come on.” 

Falco knew that Levi liked him because Falco took pride in his work, and when he was asked to clean something, he made sure that it was spotless. Levi being the neat freak that he was naturally took a liking about that fact, and always held Falco in high regard compared to his other coworkers. The downside was that whenever something as gross as this happened; Falco had to spend the entire day cleaning it all up. 

“Alright, here we are,” Levi said opening up the bathroom stall. 

“Oh my God,” Falco gasped as he saw the mess that was spread out all over the toilet seat, and spilled out onto the floor. This was not going to be easy to clean up as this was the runny, gross shit not the more solid kind. And the stench, if Falco had been squeamish he probably would have fainted when he walked in. 

“Yeah,” Levi sighed. “This is why I don’t eat Taco Bell any more.” 

Levi then handed Falco some cleaning supplies he got out the storage closet and told him. “Alright, I would do this myself, but I have to be in some boring, ass meeting with Erwin about boring, ass shit. Anyway, take however much time you need, just make sure this place is spotless by the time I get back.” 

“Will do sir,” Falco solemnly replied. 

And with that, Levi nodded and left leaving Falco to deal with the disgusting mess at his feet. It took Falco at least an hour to clean up the excretion as well as sanitize the whole stall. By the time he was done, his knees hurt from kneeling, his uniform was filthy from dropping some of the leavings on himself, and because of that fact, he smelled like gross, runny shit. 

Levi showed up just as Falco finished putting away the cleaning supplies. He looked in the stall, nodded, and said, “That’s more like it; if I ever find the dirt bag that did this, well, we’ll have some words.” 

“Put in one for me to will you.” Falco puffed still tired from the ordeal. “Hey, my shift ended an hour ago. Do you need anything else before I go?” 

“You’re good,” Levi grunted. 

As Falco turned to walk away Levi called out to him. “Hey Falco,can I ask you something?” 

“Sure,” 

“Do you have a girlfriend?” 

Falco gave him an exasperated sigh and said, “No I do not,” He was used to the question, but it still annoyed him. 

Levi surprised him by saying, “Good, I always knew you were smart. Women suck, stay single.” 

“Um, Okay,” Falco stuttered not being used to that response. 

After leaving Levi, Falco walked over to the bakery to buy some bread for sandwiches before he left. Since hand made sandwiches were most of what he and Udo ate, they always ran out of bread quickly. When he got to the bakery, he was greeted by a familiar face. 

“Finally headed home Falco?” Isabel asked. 

“Not soon enough,” Falco replied. “When are you off?” 

“Not for two more hours,” Isabel sighed. “Shitty day,” 

“You wouldn’t believe,” Falco groaned. 

Falco gave her a quick summary of the day’s events. From Hitch’s attitude, to the mess in the bathroom; it had been a pretty shitty day. 

Isabel laughed at the end of the story and said, “It figures that Levi bro would get triggered by something like that. He’s always been obsessed with cleanliness to the point where it can drive you insane. When Furlan, Levi, and I were sharing a apartment together; he would make us clean every square inch of it every week.” 

Falco had heard the interesting story behind Levi. After his mother died, Levi had lived with his neglectful uncle who happened to be a criminal. In high school, Levi had met Isabel and Furlan becoming friends with them. After high school, the three of them started pulling off petty crimes until one day they got caught shoplifting at the Safeway they were at now. Instead of calling the police like any other manager would do, Erwin made them work off what they had stole. Erwin was so impressed with Levi that he offered him and his friends’ full time jobs afterwards. Before long, Levi became Erwin’s second in command and Furlan was named the general manager of the bakery. It was apparent to everyone how much Levi respected Erwin; because no one else wanted to take a chance on a repeat offender like Levi. Now thanks to Erwin, Levi and his friends had a shot at a future. 

“Well, anyone would get triggered over the sight of shit splattered all over the floor.” Falco laughed. 

“Yeah, but it must have driven an OCD freak like Levi insane.” Isabel replied. 

“Yeah, well I got to get going here,” Falco said picking up the bread he had selected. 

“Yeah, I should get back to work before Furlan notices I’m slacking off.” 

“Right, see ya,”

“Hey Falco,” Isabel called out. 

“Yeah,” 

“Hitch is right about one thing, you should find yourself a girlfriend. Not a nasty bitch like her, but someone nice like you. I mean, any girl should consider herself lucky to have you as a boyfriend. Who knows, you might actually like having someone to share everything with.” 

Falco smiled and said, “Well, it’s nice of you to think that, but I’m no interested in a relationship right now.” 

“Okay, there’s nothing wrong with that. Just let me know if you get one so that you can double date with Furlan and I.” 

“Will do,” Falco replied as he walked off. Isabel was always nice, and because of that, she was one of Falco’s favorite coworkers. 

As Falco was purchasing his bread, he noticed that an elderly lady with a cane was having trouble pushing her cart out of the store. Without a seconds hesitation, he walked over and asked, “Excuse me, do you need help?” 

The old lady was quick to accept his help. Customers always liked Falco because he was considered one of the kindest, nicest people on earth and because he was always willing to go out of his way to help someone. Falco wheeled her cart out to her car in the parking lot, and he even unloaded her bags for her. When he was done, the lady tried to tip him which Falco refused. Before she left, she told Falco that she wished more people his age were like him. It was moments like that that always made Falco’s day. 

It was a ten minute drive from work to Falco’s apartment. After getting home, Falco changed into a black T-shirt and cargo shorts, and spent a few hours catching up on homework. After a while, he rubbed his eyes, checked his watch, and decided to take a break and go jogging. Falco had always considered jogging to be relaxing, as well as a good way to get some exercise. He grabbed his phone to listen to music as he jogged, and walked out the door. 

Falco started jogging at his usual spot at the city park located not to far from campus. He ran for about twenty minutes before he slowed down to catch his breath. He stood there hunched over, hands on his knees gasping for breath when suddenly he felt a knee whack his rear. 

“Hey, I thought that was you.” A familiar voice said. 

Falco spun around to find a certain Gabi Braun hovering over him. Falco guessed that she was jogging as well since she was decked out in athletic tights, though she was still wearing that black jacket of hers. 

“Oh, hey Gabi,” Falco said. “Are you jogging too?” 

“Yeah,” Gabi said as she removed her ear buds, “I needed to blow off some steam after work. I had, what you might call, a shitty day.” 

“Yeah,” Falco sighed, “Me too I… Oh my God, what happened to chin?” Gesturing to the bruise on her chin. 

“This, oh, well you see…” Gabi went on to recount the somewhat comedic tale off her sliding off the counter at work trying to hand a customer, who was standing to far away, his change. 

“Jeez,” Falco exclaimed, “Does that happen often?” 

“Nope, that’s a first; though I’ve had plenty other weird experiences at Starbucks. Once, we had this one customer come in and order a hamburger. It took me ten minutes to explain to him that we are a Starbucks, not a Burger King.” 

Falco laughed and said, “I can do you one better. I once had this drunk guy come in late at night, and ask me where the liquor aisle was. I directed him over to it, only a few hours later, I found him passed out in the produce aisle cuddling two bottles of wine like they were stuffed animals.” 

Gabi started laughing and said, “Uh oh, clean up on aisle five, please bring a forklift.” 

Now it was Falco’s turn to start laughing. The two kids laughed so hard they needed to lean on each other for support. 

After they stopped laughing, Gabi wiped the tears she gained from laughing and asked, “Hey, if you’re still jogging, want to jog with me?” 

“Sure, just me sure you keep up. I don’t want you getting indigestion from eating my dust.” 

“Oh you’re on douchbag. Hey, I tell you what. Who ever makes it five laps around the park first, gets dinner on the loser.” 

“You’re on,” 

And so they ran together for awhile. They were invested in the competition, but truthfully they were just enjoying each other’s company. It wasn’t till the last lap that Gabi suddenly shot ahead for the finish line they had set. Falco tried to find his second wind, but found that no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’ get ahead of her. 

“I win,” Gabi panted, “You’re buying dinner.” 

“Yeah, I guess I am.” Falco wheezed. 

“Cool,” Gabi breathed.

Falco couldn’t help but notice that Gabi didn’t seem as winded as he was. In fact, she looked like she could run a few more laps and not break a sweat. It seemed to Falco that she was just one of those athletically talented people who could run circles around average guys like him. 

“Relax, I’m not going to bankrupt you. Let’s just get McDonalds, okay.” Gabi said as she removed her jacket and threw it over her shoulder. 

“Sounds good, I haven’t had a burger in while.” Falco said. 

“You get what you want, but I am getting something healthy. Those burgers just make you fat.” 

Falco was about to comment on that, but then he realized that now that she had taken her jacket off, he could get a really good look at her body. Gabi’s athletic tights exposed her stomach and her shins showing just how muscular they both were. Falco decided that she must work out a lot. 

“Come on, it’s getting late, lets get there before dark.” Gabi said. 

“Right behind you,” Falco replied. And as he started following Gabi; he started to notice other things about her body. With her skin tight outfit on her body, he noticed her well honed back muscles, and as his eyes trailed down her back; that’s when he couldn’t help but notice her butt. It was perfectly round and muscular like the rest of her body, and he couldn’t help but watch it as she walked ahead of him. When she turned to see if he was still following her, that’s when he took notice of her breasts. They were perfectly developed. Not to big and not to small, which was what Falco liked. 

Of course, these thoughts suddenly made him feel like a pervert, since he had only met this girl last night, and already he was checking her out. He quickly averted his gave from her body worried that she would notice him examining her. While Falco wasn’t interested in a relationship, he still found girls attractive. He was no stranger to masturbation, and had spent many hours jerking off in his room when he was in high school. 

When the two arrived at McDonalds, Falco moved ahead of Gabi to hold the door open for her. 

Gabi smiled at him and said, “What a gentleman,” 

They ordered their food, and sat down in a booth to wait. After a few minutes, Gabi broke the silence and said, “Hey Falco, I’ve been wondering.” She held up her hands and stated, “Now don’t take this the wrong way, but I’ve been dying to ask, is Falco your real name?” 

Falco placed his head in his hands, sighed and said, “Yes, Falco is my real name, and yes, I do get asked that a lot.” 

“Oh, I didn’t mean to insult you or anything; I just thought that maybe Falco was just a nickname or something.” 

“No, it’s my real name; it’s on my birth certificate and everything.” 

“Wow, did you get bullied a lot in school because of that?” 

“Yes, relentlessly, me and Udo both.” 

“Oh yeah that’s right, I forgot, you and Udo went to school together. How long have you two known each other?” 

“Since we were twelve, I met him shortly after his family moved here from Poland.” 

“I remember Zophia telling me he was from another country. I thought she said Germany or something, but I guess I was mistaken.” 

“No his family’s from Poland. I guess they moved here because they didn’t like the way things were going in Europe. His parents lived through the Soviet occupation, and with continued Russian expansion in the Baltic, plus the EU encroaching more and more on Poland’s freedoms; they decided it was time to move. Everyone at school picked on him because he barely spoke English at the time, and he was always bringing weird lunches to school. I, however, took some time to get to know him, and soon enough, we became best friends. What about you, how long have you known Zophia?” 

“Oh we go back to when we were six. I was going to have lunch with some other, more popular girls, but then I noticed Zophia sitting all alone, crying at this one table. I went over and asked her what was wrong, and she told me that her parents had just got divorced, and that she wasn’t sure if she would ever see her dad again; and now no one at school wanted to be her friend because she was considered quiet and weird. So I sat down next to her, and asked her if she wanted to be my friend. She eagerly accepted, and we’ve been best friends ever since.” 

Falco smiled and said, “Zophia seems to be really lucky to have you as a friend.” 

Gabi smiled back and said, “And Udo is really lucky to have you as a friend.” 

Their food arrived at that point, and the two started eating. Gabi made a nasty face at the grilled chicken on the salad she had gotten and said, “Eww, the grilled here is always so gross. To bad it’s the only healthy thing to eat at McDonalds.” 

Falco looked up from his quarter pounder, laughed and replied, “I have a brother who used to work at a McDonalds, and he said the grilled chicken is gross because once they cook something, they don’t throw it out at all. And since they hardly sell grilled chicken, it stays in the cabinet all afternoon; same with the crispy chicken.” 

“Remind me to not eat at McDonalds ever again,” Gabi said as she took a bite of her salad. “Hey your brother, what’s his name?” 

“Colt,” 

Gabi stared blankly at him for a few moments before responding, “Okay, did your parents have a fascination with animals or something?” 

“No, its short for Colton, we just call him Colt for short.” 

“Oh, I see, once again, I don’t mean offense, I just…” 

“Again, its fine, I get asked that a lot so I’m used to it.” 

“Good, because I don’t want to piss you off or anything, since we only just met.” 

“Yeah well, I have pretty thick skin so you don’t have to worry about it. Speaking of which, want to hear about this girl at work?” 

Falco went on to tell her everything that happened between him and Hitch. When he was done, Gabi laughed and said, “Wow! What a bitch, you said her name is Hitch right?” 

“Yeah,” 

“Well there you go, Hitch is a bitch. Get it, Hitch, bitch, they rhyme.” 

“Holy shit I never thought of that before. But it does suite her though.”

“It’s like she was made for that name or something. By the way, don’t hook up with her, she probably has cooties.” 

“With the all guys she slept with, she probably does.” Said Falco

And so the two nineteen year olds spent the remainder of their meal trading horror stories about work, and complaining about coworkers. After they had neatly thrown away their trash as they didn’t like to make a mess that the employees would have to clean up; they walked out of the store. Before they went their separate ways, Gabi asked falco, “Hey do you want to see something real quick before you go home?” 

“Sure, is it close by?” 

“About five minutes, come on I’ll show you.” 

Gabi led Falco to Tybur Tower, the tallest building in the city, and owned the Tybur family, the richest family in Liberio. From there, Gabi took Falco into the building, and took him up the elevator to the top of the building. There was an area open to the public where you could look out over the city and take pictures if that was what you wanted. 

“Wow! The view is incredible from here.” Falco said. 

“Yeah it is, but this is what I wanted to see.” Gabi said, and she took his arm and led him over to the west side of the roof. What she wanted to show Falco was the sunset. Tonight was a particularly beautiful sunset, with a glowing array of colors ranging from orange to blue to pink. It was breathtaking. 

“I love sunsets,” Gabi said, “They make me feel that no matter how much today sucked; tomorrow could always be better.” 

Falco looked at Gabi as she leaned over the balcony with the breeze blowing her bangs across her face, and couldn’t help but notice how pretty in made her look. 

“Yeah, I see what you mean,” Falco replied. He paused for a bit, and the two sat their in silence enjoying the spectacle for a bit. Before Gabi broke the silence and said, “Hey I really had fun with you tonight.” 

“Me too,” Falco said, “Maybe we should do this again.” 

“We should,” Gabi replied. After a brief pause, Gabi asked Falco, “Hey Falco, do you want to be friends?” 

“I would really like that; it’ll be nice to hang out with someone else for a change.” 

“Alright then,” Gabi said as she extended her hand, “Friends,” 

Falco smiled, took her hand and said, “Friends,” 

All in all, Falco and Gabi’s day had started out horribly, but they both had to admit, it ended real nicely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I shit you not, I had a friend who work at Safeway have the bathroom incident happen to him.


	4. In Which We Meet Sasha.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I'm back. Here's a longer chapter to make up for a longer wait. I hope that Sasha doesn't feel to out of character in this, but hopefully it'll work out. Please leave comments below because they help keep me motivated.

VRRMMMMMMM VRRMMMMMM VRRMMMMMMM 

Gabi shot up in her bed to the sound of her phone vibrating. She would have looked really embarrassing in public, as her hair was spilled out all over her head with her bangs covering her eyes. She moaned in frustration as she had been sleeping nicely for a change. She shoved her bangs out of her eyes, and rolled over to answer her phone only to accidentally knock it on the floor. Cursing under her breath, she leaned over to pick up her stupid phone that had woken her up from what had been the most peaceful sleep she had had in a while. Upon picking up her phone, she leaned her head back on her pillow and answered, “Hello,” 

“Hey Gabi, it’s me,” A cheery, upbeat voice answered. 

This caused Gabi to sit up in her bed, “Sasha,” 

“Oh shit, did I wake you up?” Sasha asked. 

“What no, well, yes you did,” Gabi sputtered, “But its okay, how are you doing?” 

“Oh, I’m good as always. Hey, can I ask you something. I’m actually in town today, and I was wondering if you wanted to get together somewhere?” 

“Yeah, that’d be great, um, hang on a second,” 

Gabi got out of bed, and walked over to her dresser to look at her day planner. Upon reaching her planner, Gabi tried opening her planner one handed. However, since she was right handed, and she was holding her phone with her right hand, she ended up dropping the planner on the floor. 

“Shit,” she mumbled. 

“Are you okay?” Sasha asked. 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Gabi said as she placed her phone between her shoulder and her head, and leaned down to pick up her planner. 

“Okay,” Gabi said, “I get off class at 3 in the afternoon, so we can meet up for coffee at that café we went to last time you were here.” 

“Sounds great, man it’s been to long since we hung out. I think the last time I saw you was when the semester started.” 

“Yeah I know right. I meant to call more, but I’ve been super busy with classes and work. Say, is Connie going to be there?” 

Sasha sighed, “No, it’s just going to be you and me since Connie has to work. Ever since his company got a license for some huge game coming out next year; he’s been working twelve hour days, five days a week because the company that gave them the license also gave them an impossible deadline to meet.” 

“Wow, that sucks,” Gabi cringed. 

“Yeah but, that’s what Connie has to do if he wants to move up in his companies hierarchy. He’s hoping that in three years he’ll be made head of one of their projects, and then he’ll move up from there.” 

“Connie’s the best programmer they have. They should fast track him through whatever hoops they usually have to go through if you ask me.” 

Sasha laughed and said, “Well I’m sure Connie will be glad to know that you said that. Alright, I’ll see you at 3.” 

“Sure will, see you then.” 

“Okay then, bye,” And with that, the call ended. 

Gabi placed her phone back on her desk, and lay back down on her bed with her hands behind her head, and a big smile on her face. Mondays were always a drag since she had to go back to the long tedium of school, but getting to see Sasha today was certainly making the days seem a lot brighter.

“Mmmph, was that Sasha?” Zophia asked still in bed trying to sleep. 

“Yeah, we’re going to hang out this afternoon.” 

“So I gathered. When you see her, please remind her that it is impolite to call anyone at seven in the morning.” 

“Well, that’s Sasha for you.” Gabi chuckled, “The social graces always escaped her, and she’s a farm girl so this probably isn’t too early for her.”

Zophia grunted, wrapped her self more tightly into her covers, and said, “Well I don’t care. I hardly ever get to sleep in anymore, and when I do, I don’t want to wake up till at least nine.” 

Gabi laughed and said, “Wow! You wound have made a terrible farmer, you know that.” 

“Yeah I know, that’s why I never had any sleepovers with you when you lived with Sasha’s parents.” 

Gabi knew that Zophia wasn’t a morning person which sucked for Zophia since she worked at an IHOP and she had to get up early to work most days. Today, however, Zophia was off, and their classes didn’t start till ten, so the girls had both hoped for a nice morning of sleeping in before Sasha had annoyingly disturbed their sleep. 

Zophia sat up in her bed, stretched out her arms, and yawned. She then climbed out of her bed and removed the pink T-shirt that she always wore in place of pajamas. 

“So am I invited?” Zophia asked as she slipped into a pair of jeans. 

“No, only the cool kids get to go the most awesome get together of the century,” Gabi snarkly replied,” Besides, Sasha doesn’t like you enough to buy you any coffee.” 

“Hmmm,” Zophia made it look like she was pondering something over, “I’m pretty sure that cool kids are the ones who actually have a sex life, and don’t just touch themselves down there early in the morning when they think that their roommate isn’t noticing even though she totally does.” 

Gabi retaliated against Zophia by picking up her pillow and throwing it at her. Zophia laughed and threw it back at Gabi. Gabi and Zophia stared at each other for a few moments, before they burst out laughing

That was how the two friends worked. One of them could insult the other, and not be offended by it, because they had been through to much together to really get under each others skin. 

Once they were done laughing, Gabi quickly said, “Hey, I was just joking. You could come if you want. I’m sure Sasha wouldn’t mind having you along.” 

“Nah, it’s okay.” Zophia replied. “I’m going to have to study tonight anyway.” 

“Cool,” Gabi slide off her bed, and started pulling off her night clothes. “God, I need to spend more time with Sasha and her family. Once I graduate, I’ll probably move to Florida and I won’t see them as much.” 

Zophia shrugged as she put on a blue T-shirt, “Well who knows, maybe you’ll find an opening somewhere around here, and you won’t have to move.” 

“Hopefully that’ll be the case,” Gabi sighed. “If not, I guess I’ll just have to get used to crazy amounts of humidity in the summer.” 

“Yeah,” Zophia replied. “Hey, by the way, did you have fun with Falco last night?” 

Gabi remembered that she had told Zophia about her chance meeting with Falco while she was jogging yesterday. “Oh yeah, he was a total gentleman.” She said as she tugged on a pair of skin tight jeans. “He even bought me dinner. Of course, that was the bet we had, but he seems like someone I wouldn’t mind hanging out with more.” 

“Yeah I know, he’s a really nice guy isn’t he.” Zophia sighed before continuing, “I wish the guys at our high school had been more like him and Udo. If they had, then maybe we could’ve gone to our prom together, instead of you staying home, and me going out with that douchbag Floch.” Zophia walked over to her bed to put her night shirt under her pillow. “God, that was like the worst night of my life.” 

“Uh, yeah,” Gabi pulled a purple tank top over her head. “It’s only natural that your night’s going to suck when your date drives you out to the middle of nowhere, and keeps persistently insisting that you have unprotected sex with him in the back of his car.” 

“Yeah, don’t remind me,” Zophia snorted. “I’m just glad that you and Sasha’s mom were able to pick me up when he angrily dumped me on the side of the road for refusing to have sex with him. Well I’m sorry Floch, but I didn’t want my first time to be just another statistic in your hook up book.” 

Gabi thought about all the girls Floch had hooked up with in high school, and was glad that she and Zophia weren’t among that list. Not to say that he hadn’t tried to get both of them at one point or another. There had been, of course, the previously mentioned prom night, and he had made several very easy to see through passes at Gabi one time or another. 

Gabi sat down on her bed and started putting on some socks, “He was a total dickhead wasn’t he. If you had gone all the way with him, he probably would’ve pretended not to know you the next day.” 

“I for one, am glad that my first time was with Udo since Udo actually cared about what made me happy and not just about what he wanted out of me.” Zophia started putting her hair into a ponytail, “Just a quick piece of advice from someone who has had sex, make sure that your first time is with someone like Udo who wants it to be a happy experience for you as well as him and not with someone like Floch who only wants to love you then leave you.” 

“First of all,” Gabi held up her fingers to count, “Gross, second, I’m not interested in having sex anytime soon, and third, thanks for the advice, I’ll keep it in mind.” 

“Good to know,” Zophia chuckled, “Alright, I’m going to make some eggs, eat breakfast, and then read a bit while I’m lamenting about the sleep I lost today.” 

“Sounds like fun,” Gabi replied. 

The remainder of the day was pretty much routine. Gabi and Zophia ate breakfast, went to school, listened to Ms Pieck drone on about various mathematics, till they got out of class and they went their separate ways with Zophia going home, and Gabi having her meeting with Sasha. 

“Alright, have fun with Sasha, be sure to say hello for me,” Zophia called out as she walked away. 

“Will do, bye,” Gabi called back. Gabi pulled her jacket over her tank top as she walked away. She was in quite a good mood since seeing Sasha always brightened her day. 

Ever since Gabi was little, Sasha had always been there for her. Sasha filled a lot of roles that had been absent in Gabi’s life. Sasha was a friend, a caretaker, a big sister, and to a certain extent, a mother figure. 

Gabi’s earliest memories were her and her parents going camping. She remembered how her mom would tell the fussy little four year old child to stay out of the poison ivy, and how her dad would hold her close to him at night while pointing out the constellations in the night sky. Gabi didn’t remember much about her parents, but she remembered that they loved her more than any parent could love their child. 

One day at dinner, her parents asked her if she would like to be a big sister. Gabi had been a little confused since she didn’t know where babies came from, but she told them that she would love to have a baby brother or sister. Her parents had smiled at her, and told her that in a few months, she would have what they hoped would be, a baby brother. 

The months went by, and her mom’s stomach grew bigger each day. They told her after coming home from the doctor’s office one day, that the baby would indeed be a boy. After that, Gabi had been ecstatic over the coming baby. She would picture in her head what a great big sister she would be, how she and her little brother would grow up being the best of friends, how much he would look up to and admire her, and what a big happy family they would be. When asked about what they would name the baby, Gabi and her parents decided on Aiden.

One day, however, before she went to school, Gabi’s parents told her that they had one last check up with the doctor before the baby arrived. Gabi went to school as always, until halfway through the day, one of the teachers called her to the principle’s office. Gabi was pretty sure that she hadn’t done anything wrong, but she went anyway. Upon arriving, she was happy to see that her Aunt Karina and her cousin Reiner were waiting for her, until she noticed that they didn’t seem very happy. 

Aunt Karina had wrapped her in a big hug and told Gabi that she was going to live with her and Reiner now. When Gabi asked why, her aunt, after choking back a few tears, told her that there had been an accident, and, that her parents were dead. Gabi just stood there, her young mind trying to comprehend what she had just been told. When she found her voice, all she asked was what happened to the baby. Aunt Karina couldn’t manage to hold back tears after that. 

Gabi later found out that her parent’s car had been hit by a semi-truck that ran a red light while they were crossing an intersection. It was the first time that Gabi found herself face to face with the concept of mortality. At a young age of five, she discovered what most people don’t usually realize until their twenties; that one day some person that you love can be sitting next to you reading your favorite story, and the next day that person is just a hollow husk waiting to be buried in the ground. 

What hurt Gabi the most though, was the fact that she never got to meet her little brother. It wasn’t fair to her that unborn Aiden never even got the chance to have a life. Aiden would never get to experience riding a bike for the first time, or roasting marshmallows over a campfire, or even going to his first day of school. 

And most importantly of all, he would never know what a great big sister he would have had. Because Gabi had wanted to be there for all those moments; she had wanted to be the one who pushed off his bike the first time he rode. She had wanted to be the one to help him put marshmallows on his stick, and she had wanted to be the one to walk him to his first day of school. And when he would get nervous about going to school, she would tell him that there was nothing to worry about because his big sister would always look out for him. But because some truck driver decided that it was a good idea to have five beers before driving his potential giant death machine, neither Gabi nor her little brother would ever get to experience those moments. 

Gabi didn’t cry much at the funeral. She mostly just sat in her chair staring blankly at her parents coffins. Most of the crying was done by her aunt, who had been very close to Gabi’s dad. Every once in a while, Reiner would put his arm around her shoulders and ask if she was alright. The first few times, Gabi would just nod and quietly say that she was fine, but after the fifth time he asked, she started to break down and cry. Reiner had clearly been waiting for that moment to happen, so when she did start crying, he wrapped her in his arms and let her cry on his chest. 

Gabi and Reiner’s uncle showed up with his family as well. Reiner had quietly hoped that he and Karina wouldn’t cause an incident, but surely enough, after the service was done the two siblings started arguing about what was to be done with what little money their brother had left behind. “Oh God,” Reiner mumbled to Gabi, “Does Uncle Jack have to do this now,”

Eventually, Karina gathered up Reiner and Gabi, and left the funeral in disgust. The Braun family had a long history of conflict going back to when the three siblings were children, and apparently not even the death of their younger brother could bring them together. 

Living with Aunt Karina and Reiner wasn’t too bad. Aunt Karina went out of her way to make Gabi feel welcome, and Reiner did all sorts of things to cheer her up. When Gabi first moved in, Reiner carried most of her bags up to her new room all by himself, and when he was done, he gave her a piggyback ride all the way up to her room and plopped her on her bed. Whenever Reiner did things like that, it would make Gabi forget about her parents deaths for a while. 

Being a single parent, Aunt Karina had to work a lot, so naturally, it fell to Reiner to baby-sit Gabi when Karina was at work. It was always fun being home alone with Reiner. Even though he was ten years older then her, Reiner was always willing to play with Gabi. Together, they would play board games, various types of sports, and he was even willing to play make believe soldiers with her. At night Reiner would make mac’n’cheese, and they would spend all night watching cartoons on TV. 

Sometimes, however, Reiner would bring some of his friends’ home from school. His two closest friends were a tall, anxious guy called Bertholt, and a moody, silent girl called Annie. Bertholt was kind of nice to her, but he didn’t seem too interested in getting to know her; and quite frankly, it seemed like he only tolerate her because Reiner liked her. Annie, however, didn’t even put up the pretense of liking her, and would rudely rebuff any attempts Gabi made at playing with her. 

Since neither of them liked playing games that a five year old would like, whenever Annie and Bertholt were around, Reiner would spend all his time with them, and leave Gabi alone. Gabi would play with her toys on the living room floor while Reiner would hang out with his friends in his room leaving Gabi feeling somewhat left out and neglected since Reiner was the only friend she had at the time. 

One day, however, Gabi was sitting on the floor playing with one of her stuffed animals when she heard Reiner coming to the front door while he was talking to someone. Gabi naturally assumed that it was Annie or Bertholt, and that she was in for another afternoon of loneliness since Aunt Karina was going to be leaving for work soon, and once she was gone, neither of them would want to play with her.

Instead, she heard the sound of a backpack dropping and a voice she didn’t recognize exclaiming,”Oh my God,” 

Gabi turned around to see a girl, who was at least Reiners age, with auburn hair wrapped up in a pony tail, wearing a green hoodie, blue jeans that had holes in them, and a pair of dusty work boots, staring at Gabi with wide, cow like eyes.

“Reiner, you didn’t tell me how cute she was,” the girl exclaimed as she suddenly rushed towards Gabi. Before Gabi knew what was happening, the girl pulled Gabi into the tightest hug she had ever had in her life. 

“Jesus Sasha,” Reiner berated, “You’re going to crush her,” 

Sasha laughed and pinched Gabi’s cheeks, “Hi, I’m Sasha, one of you’re cousin’s friends, and you must be Gabi.,” Sasha let go of Gabi’s cheeks and started stroking Gabi’s hair instead, “Reiner told me all about you, including what happened to your parents. It must have been awful losing them the way you did,” Sasha sadly commented. 

That’s when Gabi realized that Sasha was different than Reiner’s other friends, since Annie and Bertholt never showed any sympathy for the loss of Gabi’s parents.

Sasha sniffled a little and smiled, “But enough about that, what are you playing with here?” 

Gabi held up her stuffed rabbit, “Oh he’s Captain Soldier bunny, he’s an awesome hero who kills bad guys and monsters.” 

“Cool,” Sasha said, “Can I play with Captain Soldier bunny?” 

“Hey I thought we were going to study and hang out later today.” Reiner said. 

Sasha let out an exasperated sigh, “We have all day to do that. And quite frankly, if you wanted me to concentrate on school you should’ve warned me about how cute your cousin was.” Sasha turned back to Gabi, “Now, where were we?” 

And so Sasha and Gabi spent the entire day playing together starting what would become a lifelong friendship. Sasha made up several awesome stories for Captain Soldier bunny, and even played the part of the giant man-eating titan that he had to defeat. When Sasha and Reiner started studying together, Sasha amused Gabi by blowing bubbles in her milk that Reiner had got out for her, and made all sorts of funny faces to make Gabi laugh.

After they were done studying, Sasha and Reiner went outside to play soccer with Gabi. They split into two teams, with Reiner on one side and Sasha and Gabi on the other. The match ended with an overwhelming win for the girls’ team, and to celebrate, they both tackled Reiner dragging him to the ground while they cackled with laughter. 

By the time Sasha’s dad came to pick her up, Gabi was wound up from all the tickling Sasha had done to her. And Sasha, on the other hand, was exhausted from all the roughhousing she had been doing with Gabi. Sasha looked like a mess too, with her shirt all wrinkled, and her hair all a mess, but she didn’t seem to mind. 

“Well,” Sasha panted, “I have to go. I’ll see you at school Reiner, and it was nice meeting you Gabi,” Sasha leaned down and planted a kiss on Gabi’s forehead which Gabi eagerly accepted. 

“Goodbye Sasha,” Gabi waved goodbye. 

“Goodbye Gabi,” Sasha waved back as she got in her dad’s truck. 

When they were alone, Reiner asked, “So did you like hanging out with Sasha?” 

Gabi nodded, went over and hugged Reiner’s leg and said, “Reiner, I want you marry Sasha.” 

Gabi couldn’t help but think of those simpler days when she was a child as she walked to the café to meet with Sasha. Back then, the only thing that could ruin her day (other than losing your parents to a car crash) was Reiner not playing with her as much as she wanted. That was before she learned how unfair life really was. That was before Aunt Karina had to be locked in a mental institute. That was before Reiner shot himself. That was before Historia and Ymir sued her and stole what little money Reiner had left her. That was before Zophia tried to kill herself. And that was before Gabi had to deal with constant anxiety and depression due to the amount of bullying she had received in high school. 

It didn’t matter now though. She’d had Sasha there to hold her hand throughout every hardship she had faced. After Reiner died, Sasha convinced her parents to take Gabi in with them when Gabi had nowhere else to go. When Historia and Ymir filed a lawsuit against fourteen year old Gabi, Sasha managed to get her friend Jean Kirsten to defend Gabi. And once when Sasha discovered a load of nasty hate messages on Gabi’s Facebook page, she quickly responded with some nasty replies of her own, much to Gabi’s dismay.

All in all, Gabi was very grateful to have a friend like Sasha. 

When Gabi finally reached the café, she saw Sasha sitting at one of the tables outside, looking down at her phone. Sasha was wearing a black long sleeve shirt, dark blue jeans, and a much more fashionable pair of boots than the muddy work boots she had worn when Gabi first met her. Anyone who knew Sasha when she was a teenager could tell that the biggest change in her appearance was her hair. She had cut her hair shorter, and had allowed her bangs on the left side of her face grow out though she still kept a much shorter pony tail. Gabi had always liked the new look as she thought it made Sasha look more mature. 

Sasha looked up from her phone, and her face lit up when she saw Gabi. Rising, she got up to greet her. “There you are,” Sasha exclaimed. 

“Hey Sash,” Gabi greeted as the two hugged each other. 

“Oh my God, it’s so good to see you,” Sasha rocked Gabi back and forth, “It’s been to long since we’ve seen each other.” 

Gabi broke the hug and said, “Yeah I know, I’ve been busy with work and school. I meant to call more, but whenever I get home I just want to fall into bed and crash.” 

“Its okay” Sasha kept her arms on Gabi’s shoulders, “I know how hard it is to balance work school and family.” Gabi smiled a little at the family part. 

The two sat down and ordered their coffee, and started to catch up. 

“So, how’s Kaya doing?” Gabi asked. 

Kaya was Sasha’s adopted daughter. Sasha and Connie hadn’t managed to have any kids in the years they’d been married, so they adopted Kaya a few years before Gabi left for college. 

“She’s doing really well,” Sasha replied, “She’s really enjoying school, and she’s made a lot of friends.” Sasha let out a sigh, “She still has nightmares about the night her mom died though. Sometimes I have to come into her room to comfort her at night when she wakes up screaming.” 

“I’m not surprised,” Gabi put her purse around the chair she was sitting on. “What happened that night was horrible even compared to what I’ve been through.” 

When Kaya was little, she woke up one night to discover that some man had broken into her house, and was attacking her mother. The man, it was later discovered, had a history of mental problems, and after killing Kaya’s mother, he then proceeded to try to eat her. While he was eating her, Kaya just sat at the foot of the stairs, to terrified to do anything. Eventually, the police came and arrested the man after being alerted by the neighbors who had heard the screams. After a few months in foster care, Kaya was adopted by Connie and Sasha. 

“Yeah, Kaya said that you kind of helped her deal with it a little.” 

“Oh yeah, back when you and Connie first brought her to meet the your parents, we were hanging out, and I told her about all the crap that happened to me when I was little and I guess that I must be a little comforting to know that you’re not alone in that regard.” 

Sasha smiled at Gabi and said, “Well it’s nice that she has a great big sister figure like you to look up to. Speaking of which, are you going to be able to make it to her birthday next year?” 

“Um, I’m not sure, but I’ll make a point to try to make whatever means necessary.” 

“Good,” Sasha nodded, “It would really mean a lot to her if you could make it.” 

At that point, their coffee had arrived. Gabi took a sip of hers and looked over to see Sasha dumping in at least twelve packs of sugar in her coffee. 

“Going to have a little coffee with your sugar,” Gabi joked. 

Sasha gave her an innocent look and said, “Hey, I’ve really cut back over the last few years. I used to put over two dozen packs of sugar in my coffee. I’ve been trying to cut back on how much I eat nowadays since my metabolism isn’t what it used to be.” 

Sasha took a sip of her coffee, and when she was done, she gave it a sad look. “I used to be able to have ten helpings of food when I went to buffets. Now I can barely eat six helpings without it going to my waist.” 

“Sounds horrible,” Gabi replied. “Hey, how are your parents?” 

“They’re good,” Sasha said, “They asked me to say hi to you when we met.” 

“Cool, say hi back for me will you,” 

“Sure will,” Sasha took another sip of coffee, “So, how are you doing?” 

“Oh, you know,” Gabi sighed, “Same old, same old; I get up, go to work, come home, fall asleep, and repeat.” 

Gabi went on to give a brief description of her life at college. She told Sasha about her frustrations at work, about how tedious school was, and about what she did in her very limited free time. 

When Gabi was done, Sasha took a sip of coffee and asked, “So who was this boy you were jogging with last night?” 

“Who Falco, He’s Zophia’s boyfriend’s roommate, we met a few days ago, and we kind of hit it off.” 

“Wait,” Sasha asked, “Is that his real name?” 

“Yup,” Gabi nodded, “And according to him, his bother’s name is Colt.” 

“No shit,” 

“No shit,” 

“Poor kid,” Sasha shook her head, “Must have sucked growing up with a name like that.” 

“He’s really nice though, we’re probably going to hang out again.” 

Sasha gave her a puzzled look and asked, “As a friend or…” 

“As a friend,” Gabi rolled her eyes, “He’s nice, but I’m not looking for a relationship right now.” 

“Okay,” Sasha nodded, “Just so you know, I’d be cool if you started dating someone. I mean, you’re young, and in your prime, you should be out mingling with young, cute boys.” 

Gabi scrunched up her face, “Sorry Sash, I’m really not interested in going out and getting hit on by douchbags like the one Zophia went out with on our prom night.” 

“No, no, no, no,” Sasha waved her hands in protest. “I’m no saying that you should start hooking up with random guys you meet in bars. I’m saying that you should start looking for the one you want to spend the rest of your life with.” 

“Yeah well,” Gabi shook her head, “I’m just trying to focus on graduating from school, and maybe when I get a real job I’ll start considering dating.” 

“If that’s what you want,” Sasha nodded before sipping her coffee. “There’s no rush I guess. But if you do start dating, make sure that the guy you’re going out with is top notch quality like you deserve.” 

“What do you mean, ‘like I deserve,’” Gabi asked. 

“Well c’mon Gabi, look at you, you’re smart, athletic, and spunky, beneath all that you’ve got a kind caring personality, and not to mention, you’re one of the most attractive girls I’ve ever met.” 

“Oh, c’mon on Sasha, you really don’t think…” 

“I do,” Sasha cut in, “You’ve got a pretty face, a perfect figure, a great ass, and perfect breasts. God, you’re prettier than I was when I was your age. If you ask me, any guy you go out with should count himself lucky to be dating you.” 

Gabi blushed and scratched the back of her head, “Oh, well, it’s flattering that you think that, but really dating is not that important to me right now.” 

“What about that Falco kid, didn’t he seem nice?” 

“Yeah, he was. It’s just, um, it’s just,” 

Just what,” 

“I think he’s gay.” 

“Really,” Sasha raised her eyebrow. 

“Yeah, he was really nice, and it’s in my experience that no guy could ever be that nice and submissive with out being gay.” 

“Hmm, are you sure?” 

“No, I just got that vibe from looking at him. He just, kind of, had that look to him.” Gabi said quietly. 

“I didn’t realize that there was a look.” Sasha said. “Hey Gabi, can I ask you something?” 

“Sure, what,”

“Have you been seeing Ms Ral? Because mom and dad said that they called her, and she said that you haven’t been making your weekly appointments.” 

Gabi shifted uncomfortable at that. She had really wanted to avoid this conversation during this visit. “Yes, I have been missing some of my sessions with her, but that’s only because I had to work and I really need the money right now. Besides, I’m fine. I haven’t had an attack in over a year now.” 

“Okay, Sasha started using the motherly voice that she sometimes used with Gabi. “I just want to make sure that you’re alright. I mean, we don’t want to have another accident because you had an anxiety attack right.” 

Gabi looked down at Sasha’s left hand, and anyone who knew her before the “incident” would notice the slightest hesitation when she went to pick something up with her left hand. 

“Of course not,” Gabi snapped, “But I really can’t afford to miss any opportunity to make money thanks to Historia and her dike of a girlfriend. And at any rate, I really don’t like sitting on a couch while Ms Ral probes into my personal life by asking questions like ‘how did you feel when your parents died, or ‘what do you think drove your best friend to almost commit suicide, or’ what caused the panic attack that made you almost kill the your big sister figure, and, best of all, ‘how did you feel after your cousin(who was like an older brother to you) blew his brains out right in front of you’. 

“Okay, Gabi…” Sasha started to say. 

“I mean, how does she think I feel about that.” Gabi ranted. “How do you think I would feel about my cousins brains spilled out all over my face and…” 

Sasha suddenly grabbed Gabi’s hands and snapped, “Gabi!” stopping Gabi’s rant. 

Sasha took a deep breath before continuing, “I’ve already told you, what happened to me wasn’t your fault. If anything, it was mine. I should’ve known better than to put a gun in your hands so soon after what happened to Reiner.” 

Gabi felt tears filling her eyes. “Yeah I know but…” 

Sasha held up her hand to stop her. “Gabi, I would really feel more comfortable if you kept up your sessions with Ms Ral, okay. I don’t want to nag, but I just want to make sure that you’re alright, okay.” 

“Okay,” Gabi quietly mumbled. “I’ll go see her every week if it will make you feel better.” 

“Alright, good,” Sasha nodded. “I’m sorry if I ruined everything by saying that.” 

“No, it’s okay,” Gabi wiped some tears out of her eyes. “I know that you just brought it up because you’re worried about me.” Gabi sighed and stared off into the distance. “It’s just hard to talk about my childhood. After I graduated high school, I told myself that I was going to start a new chapter; that I wasn’t going to be that weird girl that no one liked, who would freak out if someone touched her, and started ranting about imaginary devils trying to kill her. And I really have changed over the last two years. The few anxiety attacks that I’ve had, I’ve been able to deal with. Plus I’m actually going out and doing more things than I used to. So I am much happier than I used to be.” 

“Sasha smiled and gave Gabi’s hand another squeeze, “Good, I’m glad to hear that you’re finally happy again. For so many years I was worried that you would never recover from what happened that day with Reiner.” Sasha had to pause to wipe tears from her eyes before continuing, “But, I am so proud of you for rising above it all, and achieving what you have in these last few years.” 

“Well you know Sasha,” Gabi took a deep breath, “I wouldn’t be were I am know if you hadn’t been there to help me along the way. You and your family were there for me when everyone else had given up on me. If you had just left me to foster care after Reiner died, instead of convincing your parents to take me in, I would probably be locked up in some asylum with my aunt instead of drinking coffee with you here. 

Sasha started tearing up some more, and got out of her chair to give Gabi a big hug which Gabi gladly returned. 

“You know that I’ll always be here for you right.” Sasha said. 

“Yeah I know,” Gabi croaked, “Even though I don’t think that I’ll ever be able to return the favor.” 

After they broke the hug, Sasha realized that she needed to be getting home since she had a two hour drive ahead of her. Before she left, she offered to give Gabi a ride back to her apartment since she didn’t want Gabi walking home so late. Gabi tried to insist that she could walk home on her own, but Sasha wasn’t taking no for an answer so she ended up riding shotgun in Sasha’s Subaru. 

After arriving at Gabi’s apartment complex, they exchanged some final goodbyes. 

“Alright,” Sasha gave Gabi one final hug, “I try to see you again soon, but feel free to call me at any time.” 

“Will do,” Gabi broke the hug and started walking to the front door of her building. “Say hi to Kaya for me.” 

“I will, goodbye,” Sasha waved as she was driving away. 

Gabi had a big grin on her face as she walked into her apartment. 

“Have fun?” Zophia asked. 

“Yup, as always,” Gabi replied. 

Gabi wasn’t too fond of most people, but Sasha Brause was one of the kindest, most caring people Gabi had ever known. She could safely say that it was truly a privilege to be her friend.


	5. In Which Hange Gives Falco Monkey Business

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, thank you all for commenting, because it really kept me motivated to write this chapter. I'm not sure if Hange's in character or not in this, but I hope you all like it.

Hey Udo, come on we’re going to be late.” Falco called out to his friend. 

“Hang on a second,” Udo called back from his room, “One of the lenses of my glasses fell out.” 

Falco peaked into Udo’s room to see him carefully screwing the lens back into his glasses. Udo always made sure to take good care of his glasses since he could barely see without them. 

“There we go;” Udo grunted as he finished screwing the lens back in. “I’m probably going to have to get a new pair soon, because this pair is starting to fall apart.” 

Falco tossed Udo his jacket. “We’d better get going.” 

“Yeah, I’m coming,” Udo slipped on his jacket, and the two boys left their apartment. 

As they were walking down the stairs to the lobby, Udo turned to Falco and asked, “Hey Falco, do you want to see that new Thor movie that came out a week ago?” 

“Falco pondered it a bit before answering. “Thor:Ragnorok, Yeah, I would like to see it. The last two were okay, but this one actually looks pretty awesome.” 

“Cool, because Zophia and I were going to see it tomorrow, and we were wondering if you wanted to come along.” 

“Yeah, that sounds like fun,” Falco said, “Hey, is Gabi going to be there?” 

“I think so,” Udo replied, “Why do you really want to see her or something?” 

Falco shrugged, “It’d be fun to hang out with her again, that’s all.” 

“Yeah, Gabi’s cool,” Udo chuckled, “She can be an annoying pain in the ass, but once you get to know her, she’s actually a really great friend.” 

Falco smiled thinking about the race he and Gabi had a week ago. “Yeah, she seems like it.” 

When they reached their classroom, they sat down at their usual seats and waited for class to start. As Falco sat in his seat waiting, he found himself thinking about his last meeting with Gabi. He thought about the fun they had at dinner, trading horror stories about work, and how nice it had been to find a kindred spirit where work was involved. He thought about how the wind blew her hair across her face on top of the tower that night. And he thought about how enchanted she seemed by the light of the sunset. 

Suddenly, he felt Udo nudge him. “Hey, you seem more distant than usual. Is something wrong?” Udo asked. 

“Hmm, oh it’s nothing,” Falco stammered, “I’m just thinking, that’s all” 

“Thinking about Gabi,” Udo smirked. 

Falco was taken aback a little, “What do you mean?” He asked. 

Udo smirked again and leaned back in his chair. “Look, I love Zophia. She and I are made for each other, but I’m not going to deny that I think Gabi’s attractive.” 

“That wasn’t what I was…” Falco stammered before Udo interrupted. “Dude seriously, you’re single, and you’re a straight guy. You’re allowed to feel attracted to pretty girls like Gabi.” 

True, Falco did think about girls a lot. But there was something different about Gabi. He couldn’t put his finger on what it was, but there was something different about her. Something that made his heart flutter when he heard her name. He had had crushes in the past, but he didn’t think that any of them knew that he existed. Maybe the fact that Gabi acknowledged his existence, and didn’t seem to mind is more reclusive and introverted nature was what made him like Gabi so much. 

Falco sighed and sunk his head on his desk. “Well, she is pretty I guess. And at least she looks me in the eye when I talk to her instead of constantly looking at her phone all the time like most of the girls in our high school did.” 

“True,” Udo replied, “You know, I was thinking…” 

Before Udo could finish his thought, the door leading into the classroom suddenly opened and slammed shut, and a very familiar maniac and her bumbling assistant walked in. 

“Good morning class,” Professor Hange Zoë cheerily greeted her class. Falco watched as Hange hummed to herself while she and her assistant Moblit Burner started clearing off her desk. 

“Do you think today’s experiment is going to end in flames today?” Udo whispered to Falco. 

“Knowing Ms Zoë, probably so,” Falco murmured. “I heard that she lost her eye due to one of her crazy experiments blowing up in her face.” 

“I can believe it.” Udo sighed. 

“Alright class,” Hange removed her glasses and wiped the dust off them. “We’re going to have some very special visitors to help with our lesson today.”

Hange walked behind her desk, and started taking out various chemical containers. “Today, we’re going to make a special formula that kills fleas, but leaves the host completely unharmed.” 

Falco raised his hand. “Excuse me Ms Zoë,” 

“Yes Mr. Grice,” 

“Are these special assistants going to be dogs?” Because Falco liked dogs quite a bit, and didn’t want to see a innocent dog get hurt in the name of science. Falco became a bit worried when he saw the grin on Ms Zoë’s face. 

“You’ll see,” She said, and started her work. 

“Well this is going to be interesting,” Udo whispered. 

Hange spent the next half hour showing the class the formula for her flea remover. Falco wasn’t sure what the point of this lesson was since this was just supposed to be a basic chemistry course not a whatever random experiment Ms Zoë decides would be fun class, but he decided just to see where this was going. Besides, as long as he got a good grade he really didn’t care about what she taught. 

When Hange was finished with her chemical compound, she turned to her class and said, “Now that the formula is ready, it’s time to begin real world testing. Moblit, bring in the test subjects.” 

“Um, are you sure that’s safe, Hange-san,” Moblit sputtered, “one of those things tried to bite me last time we tried this.” 

“Oh that’s wonderful,” Hange exclaimed, “It’s so good to see that Sawney has taken a liking to you. Now bring them in please” 

Realizing that it was pointless to argue, Moblit sighed and left the room. While Moblit was gone, Falco hoped to himself that no dogs were going to be burned alive today. 

Once Moblit came back, however, it was discovered that the creatures Hange was using for her experiment weren’t dogs, but a pair of chimpanzees inside two small cages. 

“Everyone,” Hange called out amidst the gasps of the class,” I would like you all to meet our brave participants in today’s experiment. Everyone, meet Sawney,” pointing to one caged monkey who was picking bugs out of his private areas,” and Bean,” pointing to the other monkey who was picking his nose. 

“These two brave little chimps are going to help us today, in finding a way to effortlessly remove fleas without forcing poor animals all around the world to wear dehumanizing collars, or being held down while their cruel owners pour drops down their ears.” 

Hange sniffed a little, and wiped some tears out from under her eye patch. “It’s so sad that poor little creatures like Sawney and Bean here have to go through so much pain and suffering every day.” Hange started pacing back and forth across the room. “And it’s all because the soulless minions of orthodoxy won’t let me perform any proper experiments to correct this injustice against these poor souls,” Hange suddenly ranted. 

“But today, we are going to rebel against those bastards.” Hange raised her fist up in the air. “Today, we are going to show them that we will not conform to their oppressive standards, that we will take any means to free our beloved furry friends from their tormentors even if it means pushing the boundaries of normal science. Until one day, all animals shall be free. Any questions?” 

The class was silent for a while before Udo raised his hand. 

“Yes Mr. Walsultz,” 

“Where did you get those monkeys,” Udo asked. 

Hange started laughing, and did so for a while before answering, “That’s a silly question, next please.” 

When no one else raised their hand, Hange commenced her experiment. 

“Seriously,” Udo whispered to Falco, “Where did she get those monkeys?” 

Hange opened up both the cages, and let Sawney and Bean out. Falco was relieved to see that both monkey seemed to be behaving themselves. 

“Observe how Sawney and Bean here are afflicted by fleas,” Hange gestured over to the monkeys who were both aggressively scratching themselves. “Once I apply the formula, it should instantly kill any fleas while leaving Sawney and Bean unharmed.” 

Hange put on a pair of latex gloves. “Ready for formula application Moblit,” 

Moblit nervously nodded and handed her the formula. Hange gathered up the formula in a squeeze bottle and held it over Sawney. “And now to…” 

Before Hange could finish her thought, Sawney snatched up the squeezer, and took off with it. Hange ran after him, but Sawney was to nimble and kept eluding her. Meanwhile, Bean took advantage of the situation, and decided to attack poor Moblit with a ruler he found on Hange’s desk. 

“Sawney, come back,” Hange screamed as she chased him around the room. “I’m trying to liberate you.” 

Now at this point, the whole class was in an uproar with most students laughing themselves senseless. Some of the girls, however, were screaming, and climbing onto their desks to get away from the little creature that was now scurrying by their feet. Udo could barely contain his laughter, but Falco just sat there quietly watching the spectacle. At the same time, Moblit was crawling on the floor while Bean tore at his hair. Hange tried to corner Sawney, but Sawney escaped by jumping on her head and then vaulted off landing on the flagpole in the corner of the room. Hange made a grab for him, but he just scampered higher up the flagpole. 

Everyone was so focused on the monkey on the flagpole, that no one heard the door open and shut until they heard a deep, gruff voice snarl, “Am I interrupting anything ,” 

Everyone turned to the doorway to discover, to their horror, Theo Magath, Dean of Marley University. An ex-marine, Theo Magath had seen action in Operation Desert Storm, and the early stages of the Second Iraq War, and had risen to the rank of captain until an enemy grenade filled half his body with shrapnel, thus ending his military career. Magath could’ve taken a desk job if he wanted to, but he chose to take a career in teaching instead, eventually becoming dean of Marley University. 

Magath clearly took his military background to heart, since he ran a well ordered school, and didn’t tolerate any nonsense from anybody, students and teachers alike. Therefore, if Magath was visiting Falco’s classroom like this, it was clearly to give Ms Zoë a piece of his mind. 

“Hi Theo,” Hange chirped, clearly not noticing the annoyed look on Magath’s face. 

“Hello Hange,” Magath calmly replied. 

Magath slowly made his way past the long row of desks to reach the flagpole Hange was standing under. Once there, he stuck his hands in his pockets, gave Hange a hard look, and said, “I was in my office going over some paperwork, when I heard some sort of commotion coming from one of the classrooms down the hall. I wasn’t sure what I was hearing at first, but after listening more closely, I realized that the sound I was hearing was none other than the sound of some sort of monkey screaming. Upon that realization, I came to the conclusion that the commotion I was hearing must be coming from none other than your classroom, since you’re the only professor I know who could possibly make this much ruckus in my school.” 

“You know me so well don’t you Theo,” Hange smiled. 

Magath stared at Hange long and hard before clearing his throat to say, “I want these things out of my school before the end of the day.” 

“Well of course Theo,” Hange exclaimed with a smile on her face, “Once I complete my experiment I’ll…” 

“Now, Zoë!” Magath cut her off, wiping the smile off her face, “I am well within my rights to fire you right now due to the fact that I never approved your use of those animals and if word got out that you were conducting shady experiments on animals, the university would get sued by every animal rights group out there.” 

Magath took a second to catch his breath before continuing, “But for whatever reason, I still find myself taking pity on you even though every school you’ve ever worked for has fired you for reasons like this,” He said with a quieter voice, “So I’ll let this go on the condition that you get those things out of here.” 

Hange lowered her head and quietly mumbled, “Okay Theo, nothing like this will happen again, I promise.” 

“Um, excuse me,” Moblit called out, “Could somebody please help me,” 

Everyone looked to see that Moblit was still struggling with Bean on the floor. Sighing, Magath stormed over to where Moblit was, and dragged Bean off of him. Bean wasn’t happy with being manhandled, so he struggled a lot. Magath didn’t seem to notice, and only grimaced a little when Bean bit him; and with only a little effort, managed to force Bean into his cage, locking him in. That was one of many reasons why no one ever messed with Dean Theo Magath. 

Sawney, on the other hand, still refused to come down from his perch on top of the flagpole. “Sawney, come down,” Hange cried out with a distressed tone in her voice, “I know that I scared you, but I’ll make up for it I promise.” 

“If that thing damages the flag, you can kiss your job goodbye.” Magath snarled. 

“Ever the patriotic American,” Hange quipped. “Sawney, please come down before mommy losses her job.” 

“Oh for god’s sake,” Magath rolled his eyes, “Just let me do it,” Magath moved towards Sawney’s perch which seemed to scare the chimp even more. 

“Wait,” Falco called out, all eyes turning to him now. 

“You have something to say Grice?” Magath asked. 

“You’re both scaring him,” Falco pleaded, “If you two keep doing what you’re doing, he’ll just run away again, and we might never catch him.” 

“Falco’s very good with animals,” Udo spoke up; “If anyone can get an angry chimp down from there it’s him.” 

Magath looked at Hange who confirmed what Udo said, and gave Falco the go ahead. 

Falco got up from his seat, and slowly made his way over to Sawney. Once he was at the foot of the flagpole, he started talking to Sawney, “Hey there little guy,” He said in a calm, reassuring voice, “Did these people scare you, because I understand if they did. Ms Zoë can be a little overwhelming at first, but she’s really nice once you get to know her.” Hange’s jaw dropped a little at that comment. “And Mr. Magath is kind of scary, but he wouldn’t hurt you if that’s what you’re afraid of. He acts really tough and mean, but secretly he’s a really nice guy, who wants what’s best for every student at this school.” Magath raised his eyebrow since he wasn’t sure whether or not he should be insulted or flattered. 

Falco reached into his pocket, and pulled out a packet of peanuts he had saved for a snack that day. “Here,” Falco opened the packed and poured some peanuts into his hand. “Do you want some, their really good,” Sawney looked at the treat with some suspicion. 

“It’s okay,” Falco smiled, “No one’s going to hurt you,” 

After mulling it over for a while, Sawney climbed down, and jumped into Falco’s arms and wrapped his arms around Falco’s neck, causing the whole class to start cheering. Falco just gave Sawney the peanuts, and calmly took him over to his cage. Once Sawney was securely locked in his cage, Falco went back to his seat.

Magath, satisfied that everything had worked out, nodded to Falco, and walked to the door to leave. Before he left, however, he glared at Hange and said, “You know, I took a risk when I hired you Hange; please don’t make a fool out of me.” And he slammed the door as he left. 

Hange said nothing, but went over to help Moblit back to his feet. Everyone was happy when she dismissed the class early. 

When Falco and Udo were walking to the cafeteria to get lunch, Udo picked up a newspaper he found lying on the ground, and pointed out an interesting story to Falco. Falco’s jaw dropped when he read the article that detailed how two chimpanzees had been stolen from a local zoo about two days ago. 

“So that’s were she got the monkeys,” Udo said. 

A few days later, Udo and Falco walked their way over to the movie theater to meet up with Gabi and Zophia. Upon arriving, they found the two girls waiting for them outside the theater. 

“Hey guys, over here,” Zophia called out. Udo and Zophia started making out upon seeing each other, leaving Gabi and Falco to themselves for the moment. 

“Hey Falco,” Gabi greeted, “How are you?” 

“I’m good,” Falco replied, “I see that you dressed for the occasion,” Pointing to the Avengers shirt that she was wearing under her jacket.

“Yeah,” Gabi laughed, “I never see a Marvel movie without it. You look good to,” pointing to the Captain America shirt he was wearing. 

“Well, he’s my favorite Avenger,” Falco shrugged, “If you ask me, the first Avengers movie was kind of dull until he showed up.” 

Gabi laughed at that statement and replied, “I guess so. I’ll agree that Captain America is definitely the coolest Avenger, and in my opinion the second Avengers wasn’t as good because it didn’t focus on him enough.” 

Falco rolled his eyes and said, “Yeah, Age of Ultron wasn’t the best. I liked it, but I felt that it just didn’t live up to the hype. And yeah, it could’ve used more Captain America in it.” 

“Totally,” Gabi agreed. “And also, I think that he’s the hottest Avenger as well, wouldn’t you agree.” 

“I wouldn’t know about that.” Falco stammered. 

“Of course not,” Gabi smiled. 

Once Udo and Zophia were done making out, they all went inside to buy tickets. While they were waiting in line, Falco pondered on what Gabi had just said. He wasn’t sure, but he had the strangest feeling that Gabi had expected him to find Captain America attractive as well. If he didn’t know any better, he would think that she thought that he was… No. Better not to think of that he decided. 

After buying their tickets and popcorn, they all went into the theater to find seats. They were pleased to find that very few people were there, so they had a good choice of seats. An added bonus was the fact that the seats were extremely comfortable, and that they were reclining seats.

“Now this is movie watching,” Gabi exclaimed as she put her feet up, and reclined her head back. Falco gave her a smile, and followed suite. As the movie started, Falco felt Gabi nudge his arm a bit, and turned to see that she was offering him the large popcorn she had bought. 

“Thanks,” Falco said as he accepted her offer. 

“No problem,” Gabi said as she plopped some popcorn in her mouth. 

Falco turned over to see that Udo and Zophia were resting there heads against each other as they fed each other the popcorn that they were sharing. Shrugging, Falco looked at the screen, and started watching the movie. 

All in all, Falco liked the movie. The action was great, and the humor was very good; though it was a tad excessive in some areas. Falco noticed that Gabi seemed to be enjoying the movie as well; since she laughed her head off at every joke, and even spilled some popcorn on him when one joke made her laugh harder than usual. 

The scene that affected Falco the most emotionally, was the scene when Loki and Thor were in the elevator together discussing what it was like being brothers. Being a younger brother himself, Falco naturally felt the pain that Loki went through as he tried to be better than his older brother, but always failed to do so. Surprisingly enough, He noticed that Gabi also seemed to be affected by that scene, since she was wiping a tear from her eye. Falco wondered if she had any siblings as well. Of course then, the movie followed up that scene with yet another joke. 

The most exciting scene was definitely the final fight where Thor discovered his lightning powers and started destroying Hela’s army. Once the Immigrant Song began playing, Gabi started doing a little dance in her seat matching up to the beat of the music. Falco found it amusing, and decided to join her. And so the two smiled and giggled at each other as they swayed back and forth in their seats, and moved their arms in marching band style. 

When the movie was over, the kids decided to go out to dinner at the Golden Corral down the street from the theater. After getting their food they started discussing the movie. 

“Well, Udo began, “That was definitely the best of the Thor movies so far.” 

“I know right,” Gabi said, “The other two were kind of boring, but this one totally kicked ass.” 

“I think that Thor looked way better with short hair than he did with long hair.” Zophia said. 

“Hear, hear,” Gabi raised her glass. 

“I like how they established him as the god of thunder, not the god of hammers; because that always confused me.” Falco said, “I mean, he’s supposed to be the god of thunder, but he can only use his powers when he has his hammer. That never made any sense to me.” 

“Let’s hope that they don’t retcon that in the next Avengers movie,” said Udo. 

“Hopefully not,” Zophia sighed. 

After a while, Udo and Zophia got up to get more food, leaving Gabi and Falco alone. 

“Hey Gabi,” Falco said. 

“Yeah,” Gabi looked up from the piece of pizza she was eating. 

“Did you have fun today?” Falco asked. 

“I did,” Gabi smiled, “It’s been fun hanging out with you these last few weeks.” 

Falco smiled back and replied. “I feel the same way. You know, we should do again when the next Marvel movie comes out, and then we should all come here for dinner again.” 

“What like make this our tradition,” Gabi laughed. 

“Yeah why not, I wouldn’t mind discussing super heroes with you again outside of movie going if you’re interested.” 

“Sounds like a plan,” Gabi chuckled. 

“Hey Falco,” Udo called out as he and Zophia walked back over to the table. “Look at the TV” 

Falco looked at the screen that was hung up on the restaurant wall, and what he saw shocked him. 

“Is that Ms Zoë from school?” Gabi asked. 

The story on the news was about how Hange and Moblit were caught trying to sneak back into the zoo to return Sawney and Bean. As they were being dragged into a police car, Hange yelled, “I wasn’t stealing anything; I was just trying to return something that I borrowed for research.” 

“It wasn’t Hange’s fault,” Moblit called out. “I was the one who masterminded it all. Arrest me and let her go please.” 

Falco looked at his friends and said, “Dean Magath’s not going to be happy about this.”


	6. In Which Gabi Goes to Therapy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so sorry that this is late, I had the worst case of writers block,and I just couldn't get this chapter finished. I am glad to see how much of a following this is getting, and I would like to thank you all for reading this. Once again, comments keep me going, so please leave some more.

Gabi sighed as she pulled her old, beat up Subaru into the parking lot outside Ms Ral’s office. She hadn’t been particularly looking forward to this meeting, but knew that she had to go through with it otherwise Sasha was going to have a fit about her not going. Gabi rested her head on the steering wheel and moaned since this was not how she wanted to spend her morning. 

“All right,” Gabi said to herself, “I just have to go in, convince Ms Ral that I’m not going to kill myself, pick up groceries, and then go home and try to salvage what’s left of this rotten day.” 

Gabi looked up into her review mirror, and pushed some loose strands of hair behind her ears. She knew that she had to look presentable if she was going to convince Petra that she was doing alright. After grabbing her purse from the seat beside her, she opened up the car door and stepped outside ready for the beginning of another miserable day. 

Something that resembled the smell of a new car greeted Gabi when she walked through the door. She figured that all professional office buildings must smell this way, which was something she had to look forward to when she graduated. Gabi walked over to the receptionist’s desk to check in. 

“Hey Olou,” Gabi greeted Petra’s receptionist. 

“Hello Gabi,” Olou smiled, “Haven’t seen you in a while.” 

“Yeah, I’ve been busy with work and school.” Gabi said, “Anyway, I’m here to check in for my ten’ o’clock appointment.” 

“Sure,” Olou handed her a clipboard. “Just sign here and take a seat when you’re done.” 

Gabi did as he said, and sat down and waited. Gabi tried to pass the time by looking at the various magazines that littered the table in front of her. When she ran of magazines that interested her, she pulled out her phone and played solitaire. Everything was fine, until some strange fat guy sitting next to her started looking over her shoulder to stare at the game. Gabi wasn’t comfortable with his proximity to her face, but didn’t say anything because she had gathered that this guy clearly wasn’t right in the head since he had been having a very loud conversation with himself before he started looking at her phone. She endured the uncomfortable situation for about half an hour before Olou told her, “Ms Ral will see you know.” Gabi happily stood up and made for the door to Petra’s office as fast as her legs could take her. 

When Gabi walked into Ms Ral’s office, she found Petra going over some papers she had on her desk. Petra Ral didn’t look quite how you would imagine a physiatrist. Instead of wearing some sort of suit or any type of fancy clothes, she wore a plaid flannel shirt covering a Star Wars T-shirt, blue jeans with holes in them, and a simple pair of tennis shoes. When Petra looked up, she saw Gabi and smiled at her. Petra had one of those smiles that made you feel like you were the most special person in the world which was something that Gabi sometimes needed to feel. 

Petra pushed back her chair, and stood up. “Gabi,” Petra greeted, “It’s good to see you again.” 

“Hey Ms Ral,” Gabi smiled, “It’s good to see you to.” 

“Well, if you’d like to sit down,” Petra gestured to the sofa by the window. “We could begin,” 

“Right, sounds good,” Gabi tried to keep a straight face and act somewhat enthusiastic, but truthfully, she wasn’t comfortable with sharing her innermost feelings with anyone even someone as nice as Ms Ral. 

“So, Gabi,” Petra sat down in a chair with her notebook in her hand, and crossed her leg over her knee. “How are you doing?” 

“Fine, I guess,” Gabi took a seat on the sofa. “Work’s fine, school is okay, things could be worse I suppose.”

“That’s good to hear,” Petra nodded, “Do you like this new job better than your old one?” 

“Well, yeah,” Gabi snorted. “At least at Starbucks I only have one cranky coworker to deal with instead of my first job where everyone treated me like shit.” 

“Good,” Petra jotted down some notes on her pad. “And you’re doing well in school I hear.” 

“Oh of course, school’s always comes easily to me.” Gabi leaned back on the sofa and sighed. “It’s people who always bother me.” 

“Really,” Petra brought her pen up to her mouth. “And what is it about most people that bother you so much?” 

Gabi rolled her eyes in annoyance. “Oh I don’t know, probably the fact that most people I meet are just the rudest, nastiest jackasses in existence. I mean, all my life I’ve tried to be nice to people, and all that seems to do is make them angrier. At work all I try to do is make customers happy, because I do like making people happy, but they always find something to complain about, making my day miserable.” 

Petra nodded while taking more notes. “Water,” she said as she offered Gabi a cup. 

“Yes please,” Gabi eagerly accepted the paper cup. “Thank you,” She said before taking a sip. 

“And don’t even get me started about the internet.” Gabi said as she put down the cup.” I basically got forced off Facebook, because of all the trolls giving me crap all the time.” 

“Were the things that these people said really so hurtful that they made you close down your Facebook account?” Petra asked. 

“Oh my God,” Gabi threw her hands up in the air. “You wouldn’t believe some of the things people say on the internet. When I was in high school, there wasn’t a day that went by when someone wasn’t sending me a message telling me that I was a piece of shit, or that I deserved to die or something.” 

“Well you know Gabi,” Petra cut in. “What’s ironic, is that most of those people would never dare say those things to your face. People on the internet only say things like that, because they know that they won’t be retaliated against; whereas in real life, such things are completely unacceptable in normal day to day interactions.” 

“I know right,” Gabi scoffed. “It just astounds me just how awful people can be when they have no inhibitions. You know, my foster parent, Mr. Brause, you’ve met him; he once told me that it seemed to him the internet has given people the excuse to be their own worst selves.”

“Do you know why they targeted you all the time?” 

Gabi took a deep breath before answering. “Because when I moved in with my foster family after my cousin died, I was kind of a mess. You remember me at that time, I was a nervous wreck who would jump at the slightest noise, and hated being touched.” 

Petra nodded. “I remember, and I’m happy to see how much you’ve improved since then.” 

“Yeah, well, when I went to my new school, everyone thought that I was the weirdest kid they had ever met, so I became a prime target for bullying.” Gabi sighed as she looked out the window. “It’s really hard to get through high school after you just walked away from a great, personal tragedy, and everyone at school is telling you that you’re the worst person who ever existed and, even though you’re only thirteen years old, that you should be killed in the most horrific way possible because people want to make you feel like shit just so that they can get a good laugh.” 

“And did you ever believe the things they said?” 

Gabi shifted uncomfortably in her seat. “Sometimes I did,” She quietly replied. “Sometimes I would look through my Facebook account, and go through all the nasty messages people would leave. And after a while, I would start to think that maybe all these things that they were saying about me were true.” 

Petra raised her eyebrow. “And what things would those be?” 

“Oh I don’t know,” Gabi shrugged. “They would say that I was a deranged psychopath, and that I needed to be put in a mental hospital with my aunt, and I would think about my mental state at the time and I would think to myself that maybe for the good of other people I should be put away so that I don’t hurt anyone ever again like I did with Sasha.” 

“Ms Brause always told me that that particular incident was an accident.”

“It doesn’t matter!” Gabi exclaimed. “I had a major freak-out, and I almost killed her. She went through all that trouble to get me into a nice home instead of being swept away into the foster care system, where I wouldn’t have lasted a day in my mental state at the time. And how do I repay her, I shoot her, and almost kill her. Tell me, what kind of friend does that to another friend.” 

“Well Gabi,” Petra gently replied. “In my conversations with your friend Sasha, she always told me that she felt that the whole thing was her fault since she should have known that giving a traumatized girl a firearm was a bad idea.” 

“Yeah, I know,” Gabi mumbled. “That’s what she always told me too. I still feel horrible about it though.” 

“Well that’s natural,” Petra said. “Anyone would feel a tremendous amount of guilt after nearly killing someone.” 

“It’s just,” Gabi stammered. “It’s just that I feel that she was just telling me that so I wouldn’t feel bad about myself. Which is nice, since if it weren’t for her, I probably would’ve killed myself long ago?” 

“Well of course she would try to make you feel better Gabi. Sasha clearly recognized that adding on a layer of guilt to the amount of pain you were feeling, would only lead to you degenerating even further. After all you were still trying to recover from what happened to your cousin…” 

“You mean when my cousin Reiner shot himself right in front of me.” Gabi snapped. You mean the time when he took his gun and splattered his brains all over my face. Well naturally I was traumatized. The person I cared about the most in life, decided to kill himself right in front of the one person who loved him the most. Yeah, I think that would leave someone screwed up for life.” 

The room was silent for a while as Gabi pulled her knees up to her chin, and started rocking back and forth a little. After a few moments, Gabi sniffed, and wiped a tear out of her eye before she continued. “I still don’t understand why he couldn’t just take five extra minutes to walk outside, and kill himself out there. I mean, it still would’ve sucked with him being dead and all, but at least I wouldn’t have that image in my head of his dead, lifeless eyes rolling in his skull.” Gabi tried to blink back tears, but to no avail. “Why would he do something like that me? He knew how much I loved him. Why would he hurt the one person who loved him no matter what he did? Why?” 

“I don’t know Gabi” Petra sighed. “And I don’t think we ever will.” 

Petra gave Gabi a tissue which Gabi eagerly accepted. “God, I hate coming here.” Gabi wiped her eyes. “I hate having you probe into me trying to get me to talk about things that I don’t want to talk about. That’s why I didn’t show up for my last few appointments, because I hate thinking about things like this. The only reason I showed up today, is because you would tell Sasha’s family that I didn’t show up, and then they would start to freak out and I really don’t want to worry them like that.” 

Petra stared at Gabi for a few moments with a sympathetic expression on her face. After taking a deep breath, she spoke up. “You know Gabi; I had a patient like you once. Both his parents were murdered when he was the same age you were when your cousin committed suicide. His older brother took him in, but he never fully recovered from the trauma he received. I tried to help him as best I could, but he progressively got worse as time went on. He stopped showing up for his sessions, but I didn’t pressure him since I thought that maybe he just needed to deal with this on his own. Until one day, his brother called to tell me that the police had shown up at his door to tell him that they thought that his brother had murdered someone.” Petra sighed before continuing. “Last I heard of him, he was sentenced to ten years in prison.” 

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.” Gabi said 

Petra nodded. “Gabi, I can’t lose another patient the way I lost him. He had so much potential, and it was all thrown away because of one bad moment in his life. I don’t want the same thing happening to you, okay. You could go so far in life, and I don’t want you to lose it all just because one horrible moment screwed your whole life up. So that’s why I want you to keep up your sessions with me; so that if you do start to slide in the wrong direction, I can help push you back to where you need to go.” 

Gabi quietly nodded her head in agreement. “Okay, Ms Ral, I’ll be here every week, I promise.” 

Petra smiled and nodded. “Thank you Gabi, I just want to help you that’s all.” 

“And you really do,” Gabi sniffed. “I know I was complaining earlier, but you really are one of the few people that I feel comfortable talking about this stuff with.” 

“Good,” Petra leaned forward to hold Gabi’s hand. “And I want you to know that if you start to have more problems, call me immediately. I’ll be more than willing to help.” 

“Thanks,” Gabi smiled. “It’s good to know that I have, at least, a few people on my side.” 

“Well” Petra checked her watch. “I’d say that this wraps up our session today. I’d like to see you back here at the same time next week.” 

“Sounds good,” Gabi grabbed her purse, and got up to leave. Before she made it out the door, Petra called out to her. “Hey Gabi, you want to know something interesting.” 

“What?” 

“The patient I told you about, the one you were so similar to.” 

“Yeah,” 

“Well another interesting similarity that you two have is that you two look incredibly similar to each other to each other.” 

“Hmm,” Gabi pondered it for a second. “Weird coincidence huh,” 

“Just a fun fact that I’d thought I’d let you know.” 

It was a half hour drive back to Liberio, so Gabi had plenty of time to consider where she was going to buy groceries. The easiest option would be the Albertsons her store was located in, but she wasn’t in the mood to run into anybody that she knew today. So, she decided to head to the Safeway located ten minutes from campus instead. 

A while later, Gabi browsed through the aisles picking up the various items on her grocery list. Eggs were a must, since she and Zophia ate a lot of them. Milk, because they were almost out. Various frozen foods, because that was what they lived on. Some sort of spicy pickles? Yeah, Zophia could be really weird sometimes. 

The final item was bananas, which were Gabi’s favorite fruit. Gabi was picking out some good looking pairs of bananas, when a voice from behind her said, “Hey there,” 

Gabi turned around to find no other than a certain Falco Grice standing behind her. 

“Oh hey dude,” Gabi extended her fist, “I forgot that you worked here.” 

Yeah,” Falco bumped her fist back. “I just got off my shift, actually.” 

“Cool, I was just about to check out.” 

“Hey, I could help you carry your stuff out to your car if you’d like.” 

“Oh, that’s okay, I can handle it.” 

“Seriously, it’s no big deal, I’d be glad to help.” 

Gabi couldn’t help but smile at Falco’s kindness. “Well, I guess if you insist.” 

After checking out, Gabi wheeled her cart out to the parking lot where Falco helped her load her groceries into her car. After they were done, Falco looked at her car and said, “You have a very nice car.” 

“Are you kidding,” Gabi laughed. “It’s a piece of junk. I only got it because it was cheap, and it gets me to where I need to go.” 

“The Millennium Falcon was a piece of junk, and it’s one of the coolest ships in fictional history.” Falco reminded her. 

Gabi couldn’t help but laugh at the Star Wars reference he had made about her car. 

“Hey Falco,” Gabi called as Falco was about to leave. 

“Yeah,” 

“Do you want to come over to my place and hang out?” 

Falco shrugged and said, “Sounds like fun,” 

“Great, follow me when you drive home.” 

Ten minutes later, they arrived at Gabi’s apartment building. Falco was nice enough to carry most of Gabi’s groceries for her. Gabi was noticed that he carried six bags to her four, which, fortunately, made the load lighter on her. After they arrived in her apartment and put all the groceries away, Gabi turned to Falco and said. “You really didn’t need to do all that, but thank so much for your help.” 

“Hey, you’re a friend, right, that’s what friends do for each other.” Falco replied. 

Gabi still found herself amazed at how nice this guy was. And it didn’t seem like a fake ‘hey I’m acting nice to you, but what I really want is to get inside your pants’ type nice. No, it seemed that Falco was just being nice because he wanted to make people happy, which was something that Gabi could appreciate. He was obviously gay though. Straight guys never acted this nice unless they wanted something. 

“Well, thanks anyway,” Gabi said. 

“You’re welcome,” Falco replied. 

“Hey, want to watch football together this afternoon?” Gabi gestured to the TV. 

Falco thought about it for a second and said, “Okay, Udo’s working, so I was going to be watching alone anyway. But it is a lot more fun to watch with someone else. Is Zophia going to be coming home?” 

“No,” Gabi shook her head. “She’s working too. So I was going to watch the Broncos get their asses kicked all by myself.” 

“Yeah, we’re pretty bad this year.” Falco agreed. “But it’s still fun to complain about them with someone.” 

“Cool,” Gabi took off her jacket, kicked off her shoes and sat down on the couch. “C’mon, the games about to start,” 

Falco smiled and joined her on the couch. Gabi made some popcorn, which they shared, and they sat there for a while and enjoyed the game. A while later, Gabi turned to Falco and asked, “Hey Falco, just out of curiosity, do you have a Facebook account?” 

“Um, no, I was never into social media.” Falco replied. “I always preferred to have real friends, and I like to talk to people face to face.” 

Gabi nodded. “I was wondering, because you seem really nice, and in my experience, most people who I used to know online weren’t very nice people.” 

“Oh,” Falco gave her a confused look. “Thank you for saying that. I try to be nice as much as I can be.” 

Gabi smiled at him. “Well, just so you know, you do a really good job at being nice. It’s why I like hanging out with you.” 

Falco just smiled and nodded at her. And so the two sat there and watched football all afternoon, while enjoying each others company. Gabi realized that while there were many miserable people in the world who liked saying nasty things about her. Falco, fortunately for her, was not one of those people.


	7. In Which The Seasons Change

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, the next issue of Attack on Titan will be out in a few days. I'm so scared for what's about to happen next. It's up to our hero Falco to save us all from Eren when he uses the rumbling to wipe out the world. I really liked this chapter so everyone should like it. Please leave comments as they really do help.

This summer, had been a long one. The nice, warm weather had lasted from late May, to now, in the last days of October. The leaves on the trees had turned brown long ago, and most of them had fallen off the trees they once grew on, to form a vast sea of brown on the lawn of the college. Where once bright sunshine filled the sky above, now grey clouds loomed ominously above the town. While it hadn’t snowed yet, there was a chill in the air that signified the coming of the cold frosts of winter. 

Falco’s favorite part of the change of seasons, was watching huge flocks of Canadian geese make their way south for the winter. When he was younger, he would sit outside for hours listening for the honks of the geese as they flew overhead. When he heard a flock flying above his house, he would scan the sky looking for them so he could see how big the flocks were, and what strange formations they had assumed. 

And so here Falco was, sitting on top of his dorm complex looking up at the sky trying to catch a glimpse of the large birds flying by. The cold winds nipped at his face, but he paid it no mind. He actually liked the cold, so a little cold breeze didn’t bother him at all. Since many of the people who lived in his dorm came up here to smoke, the area around him was littered with cigarette butts, so he had to clear out a little area for him to sit down on. 

Falco often wished that he could be like those birds that soared through the sky over him. He wished that he could fly through the clouds free from all the responsibilities, expectations, and worries that plagued him. He wished that he wasn’t such an introvert who always bent over when people said bad things to him at work. He wished that when Hitch teased or nagged him about something, that he would tell her to fuck off and she would never bother him again. 

It had occurred to Falco, while he had been watching football with Gabi several weeks ago, that he wished that he was like Gabi. While he was quiet and shy, Gabi seemed bold, outspoken, and completely confident in herself. He wished that he could have the ability to just say whatever was on his mind without fear of consequences. He wished that he could was more confident in himself, and didn’t constantly worry about the future. If he didn’t worry so much then maybe he would be willing to try new things, and not just do the same thing over and over again every day of his life. 

“See any big flocks?” A familiar voice snapped him out of his thoughts. Falco turned to see Udo emerge out of the door that led to the roof. 

“Nope,” Falco shook his head, “I did see one group that had at least ten or eleven geese in it, but that’s the biggest one that I’ve seen in a while.” 

Udo walked over to where Falco was sitting, kicked some cigarette butts out of the way, and sat down cross legged beside Falco. Once Udo was comfortable, he produced a vaping pen out of his pocket, and brought the pen to his lips to start smoking. Udo had started vaping in college, but since their dorm building was supposed to be odor free, he had to come up here to vape. 

They sat in silence for a while. Udo smoked, and Falco looked up the sky watching for birds. After a few moments of silence, Falco turned to Udo and asked. “Hey Udo, can I ask you something?” 

Udo removed the pen from his mouth, and blew out a trail of vapor. “Yeah, what’s up?” 

“How,” Falco took a deep breath. “How do you do it?” 

“Do what?” 

“How do you, I don’t know, turn off your inhibitions?” 

“What do you mean?” Udo asked. 

“Well, it’s just, when we were younger; you were always so quiet and shy. But ever since we came to college, you’ve really came out of your shell. I mean, you go from spending your prom night playing video games with me at my house, to staying out late partying and having sex with your girlfriend. If you don’t mind me asking, what changed?” 

Udo pondered it over for a while before answering. “Well, before you knew me, I was actually very outgoing when I was growing up in Poland. It’s when my family moved here to America that I became more introverted. Moving here was a complete shock for me so I was naturally nervous when I talked to everyone. And since I was a weird Polish kid who barely spoke English and stammered when I talked, no one was nice to me at school except you. And with everyone at school picking on me, I lost any self confidence that I had when I was younger, which led to me becoming that quiet and shy kid that you knew when we were kids.” 

Udo put his pen in his mouth, and took a long, hard drag before continuing. “Then, when we came here to college, I met Zophia. That’s when things started to change for me. You see, Zophia and I were similar in a lot of ways. We were both kind of quiet and shy. Our self confidence was equally low. And we had both never really dated anyone before (well Zophia did go out with this one guy on her prom night, but it turns out that he was a perverted dickhead who just wanted to have sex with her, since she seemed like an easy target, but he doesn’t count) so it was a learning experience for us both.” 

“Dating Zophia changed you?” asked Falco. 

“Kind of,” Udo shrugged. “Being together changed both of us really. I mean, if you had met Zophia before we started dating, you wouldn’t have recognized her. She hardly ever spoke or smiled, and if you tried talking to her, she would try her best to get out of the conversation. And if you look at her now, she’s always smiling, and she holds conversations with people other than Gabi.” 

“But what about, umm…” Falco wasn’t entirely comfortable broaching on this subject, but it was a topic he had been wondering about for a while. “What about sex?” 

Udo couldn’t help but laugh at his friend’s obvious insecurity about this issue. “Yeah, what about it?” 

“Well, it’s a pretty big leap from playing video games on prom night, to constant sex every other night. How did you make that leap?” 

“Well since neither of us had done it before, we were both pretty nervous the first night that we went all the way.” Udo smiled at the memory of that night. “Turned out that sex was amazing, and it’s just come naturally to us ever since.” 

“Do your parents know?”

“Oh God no,” Udo exclaimed. “They don’t know, and I’d rather keep it that way if you don’t mind.” 

“And what happens if you and Zophia have an accident and she ends up, well you know…” 

Udo inhaled some more smoke in his mouth, and exhaled it out through his nostrils. “Pregnant, that’s what you mean right.” 

Falco nodded. 

“Well, we do use protection. And if we happen to run out of condoms when we have our urges, I always make sure to pull out of her.” Udo sighed and ran his hands through his hair. “But, if I ever do get her pregnant, I’ll take responsibility for it and I’ll be there for her every step of the way.” 

“You’re not worried about what your parents might think or about how Zophia would react…” 

“Falco, dude, seriously,” Udo let out an exasperated sigh; “I love Zophia, and one day, I do plan on marrying her. We’re just not ready for that step yet. And as for my parents, they’re…” Udo imitated his mother’s heavy Polish accent for the next part. “Happy that I found a nice American girlfriend to fall in love with,” 

Falco couldn’t help but laugh at his friend’s imitation of his Polish mother.

“And when they found out that I, hypothetically, got Zophia pregnant, they would be a little upset at first; but I think that they would come around eventually and they would probably be happy to be grandparents.” 

Falco nodded in agreement. “Your parents were always more laid back about that stuff than mine were.” 

“Seriously though,” Udo asked. “What’s bothering you? We usually don’t have heart to hearts like this unless something is eating at you.” 

Falco shrugged. “I don’t know, it’s just, I’m nineteen years old, and I feel like I haven’t really done anything my whole life. I mean, all I’ve ever done is work and study. I’ve never really done anything new or exciting because, quite frankly, I’ve always been too afraid to leave my comfort zone. And now I’m in college, free to do whatever I want without having to worry about my parents looking over my shoulder while constantly lecturing me on what the Christian thing to do would be. And once I graduate, I’m going to be so busy with work that I won’t have time to do anything interesting at all.” 

Udo gave his friend a nudge in the shoulder. “Hey, I hear you man. I get it; you want to enjoy life while you’re young and free. Zophia and I came to the same conclusion some time ago. Life’s too short, if you don’t enjoy it now, while you’re young, you’ll just let it fly right by you, until one day when you’re too old to really enjoy life, you’ll look back and wish that you had lived a little when you were younger. That’s why Zophia and I do the things we do. So that when we become old, boring farts, who’s only highlight of the year will be our grandchildren visiting us for a week, we’ll have all these fun memories to look back on.” 

Falco turned his gaze back to the clouds for a moment, before turning back to his friend. “Don’t take offense to this, but I don’t see the fun in getting wasted and having sex with girls that I’ll forget about in the morning.” 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Udo interjected. “I don’t mean that you should go to singles bars and hook up with ugly skanks who probably have some sort of STDs or something. What you should do is find a really nice girl like Zophia, and start hanging out with her. Figure out what it is that you two like to do together whether it’s getting drunk together or simpler stuff like you would prefer and get into a legitimate relationship with her. And then, once you’re certain that she’s the one you want to spend the rest of you’re life with, take her back to your place or hers and have some awesome, intimate sex with her.” 

“Oh I see,” Falco chuckled. “You believe in a sort of blend of traditional morals and a more modern view of a relationship.” 

“Well yeah, I don’t fully agree with the whole, no sex before marriage thing, but I don’t like the idea of having meaningless sex with someone I don’t care about.” 

Falco nodded in agreement. “If I ever do have sex, I’d want it to be special. Something that I’d remember the rest of my life, not just a random fuck in the back of someone’s car; I guess that’s why I’ve never dated anyone in my life, because I’ve never met a girl that seemed really all that special.” 

“Ah, I see, you’re waiting for that one special girl that you just instantly know is the one you’ve been waiting for your whole life.” 

“That basically sums it up. I don’t know about other people, but I want something special in a relationship, like what you and Zophia have. I want to wake up on the morning after our first time, and feel nothing but love and adoration for my partner, instead of just ‘oh that was good, now to move on as if nothing happened’. I mean, why waste time zooming around with other girls when you could be having an amazing relationship with the perfect girl of your dreams.” 

Udo raised his pen in the air as a toast. “I hear you man.” 

Falco took another look at the cloudy sky, and watched a small flock of geese making their way down south fly by. He smiled, since he felt more at peace now than he did when he first climbed up the roof today. “Hey Udo,” he said to his friend. “Thank you for talking about this with me. I mean, I know that we’re not the most touchy, feely guy out there. So I know that this probably wasn’t the most comfortable conversation to have. But I want you to know, that I do appreciate your input to my little dilemma here.” 

Udo shrugged his shoulders. “Hey, no problem, you were always my emotional support in middle school. It only makes sense that I return the favor now that I’m feeling better off, and you’re going through whatever inner turmoil you’re going through.” 

Udo shut off his vaping pen, leaned a little closer to Falco, and said. “Hey man, if you really are serious about this whole getting out there and living thing, some of the guys in my med classes are throwing a party on Halloween, and I was wondering if you would want to go with me?” 

Falco felt his stomach sink to his bowels. A party, an actual party, growing up, Falco’s mother had always denounced such things as full of sin and debauchery. Even suggesting going to such an event like a college frat party would’ve enraged her. He had very vivid memories of the time Colt, who was seventeen at the time, had come home drunk late one night. Let’s just say that a screaming mother makes your hang over ten times more painful than it would normally be. Of course Colt had to spend the next month being lectured about his immoral and unchristian behavior for the following month. 

Needless to say, if Falco’s mother found out that he went to a party with sex and alcohol involved, she’d probably demand that he return home and complete his college education online, under her supervision. He still had at least ten books and pamphlets that she had given him explaining how young Christians can avoid sinful behavior like sex, drugs, and alcohol while living away at college.” 

“I don’t know Udo,” Falco stammered. “Going to a loud, noisy party with drugs and alcohol isn’t really my thing.” 

“Hey, it’s not going to be that bad.” Udo explained. “It’s just going to be like thirty people tops. And if you don’t want to do drugs or get drunk, you don’t have to. You can just hang out in a corner and help yourself to food and candy if that’s what you prefer. And, in all honesty, it really doesn’t sound like there’s going to a lot of any of those things at the party.” 

Falco was still conflicted though. While yes he did want to go out there and start experiencing new things; he wasn’t the most social creature. And quite frankly, he didn’t like the idea of being in a room full of people he didn’t know, with whom he was being forced to interact with. “Well, I don’t know,” he mumbled. 

“Just so you know, Gabi and Zophia are going to be there.” 

Now that changed everything. If it was just him and Udo he would probably say no. But the fact that Gabi was going to be there made all the difference. Spending time with Gabi these last few weeks had been pleasant to say the least. He found himself thinking of all the fun he had when they were together. He thought of the time she had knocked a bowl of popcorn on the floor when she cheered the Broncos scoring a touchdown when they had watched a game together. He thought of the loud burps she made when she drank to much soda at McDonalds. So if she was at that party, then surely it would be worth going to. 

Falco thought about it for a minute, and made his choice. “Well, if everyone’s going, then maybe I’ll give it a shot.” 

Udo smiled at his friend. “Great, I’ll tell them that you’re coming. Oh bye the way, it’s a costume party, so you’ll have to figure out a costume to wear.” 

“Oh, okay,” Falco wasn’t too happy about that. The idea of wearing a silly costume in a room full of strange people wasn’t something that he found appealing. Hopefully, he could find something that passed as a costume, but wasn’t completely ridiculous. 

On the day of the party, Falco bought a black leather jacket as a costume, and decided that if anyone asked, he would just say that he was Mad Max. It wasn’t very original, but it was the best that he could come up with. Udo was wearing a suit that had mud stains caked on the bottom. When Falco asked who he was, Udo explained that he was Wolverine from the movie Logan. 

It was dark out when the two of them made their way to the building where the party was being held. There was a cold chill in the air that made Falco wonder if this was the night that it was finally going to snow. He found himself wishing that he had brought a warmer coat, because this leather jacket just wasn’t providing enough protection from the cold winds that nipped his face as he walked by. 

.Upon arrival at the party, Udo knocked on the door, and was admitted by one of his classmates, a large guy named Franz. Falco was pleased to discover that Udo had been true to his word since there weren’t that many people there. It was loud though. Some sort of noisy, modern rock band was blasting from the speakers mounted on the wall as the other party members hung out in little clusters around the room. Udo and Falco shifted their way through the crowd until they found the people they were looking for. 

Gabi and Zophia were standing next to the concessions stand, sipping punch as they tried to talk to each other over the deafening noise. Zophia was wearing a jean jacket with a unicorn shirt underneath, and Gabi was wearing some sort of army brown uniform with black suspenders going over her shoulders, and a weird looking safari hat on her head. 

Gabi’s face shot up when the boys walked over to them. “Well there you guys are, for a moment there we thought you weren’t coming.” 

“You both know that I wouldn’t miss any opportunity to hang out with my favorite girls in the world.” Udo said. 

“I’m glad you came.” Zophia gave Udo a kiss. “Hey Falco,” 

“Hey Zophia, who are you supposed to be?” Falco gestured to Zophia’s jean jacket. 

“I am X-23 from Logan. Udo and I thought that it would be fun if we dressed up as Logan and Laura for Halloween.” 

“And what are you Gabi?” Falco asked. 

“Oh,” Gabi looked down at her uniform. “I’m a soldier.” 

“Like in World War 1 or something,” The uniform did look extremely dated. 

Gabi shrugged. “I don’t know, I threw it together last minute.” 

“Same here,” Falco pointed to his jacket. 

“Is that a safari hat?” Udo inquired. 

Gabi’s eyes rolled up to look at her helmet. “Oh, well, I didn’t have a helmet so I bought this hat at a pawn shop for ten dollars. I’ll admit, it does look pretty, fucking ridiculous.”

Falco spoke up. “Oh I don’t know about that. While yes, the hat does look kind of silly, the whole uniform looks pretty good on you.” 

Gabi blushed, a little, and smiled at Falco. “Oh… well um… thank you for saying that. I thought that everyone was going to give me crap about my shitty costume.” 

Falco shrugged. “It’s not as shitty as mine.” 

“Hey,” Gabi gave Falco a punch in the shoulder. “Don’t say that, you look really badass in that jacket.” 

“Okay,” Udo cut in. “We’re all agreed that everyone’s costume is cool. Now is anyone else ready to start having some fun?” 

No one could object to that. For the next hour or so, Falco roamed around the room watching people eating food, drinking strange drinks, dancing, and playing various party games. Falco didn’t join in the fun; he just stood off to the side, and ate a few snacks here and there He tried talking to some of the guests, but they were to busy playing on their phones, or complaining about how lame this party was. 

After a while, however, things started to get a little crazier. It turned out that half the drinks had been spiked with alcohol, causing everyone to start behaving a lot more wild than they were before. Everywhere Falco looked, he saw people making out, vomiting into trash cans, having sex, and other types of weird behavior. Falco tried looking for Udo, but found him making out with Zophia. It looked like the two were going to go further in a few minutes, so Falco decided to take his leave and headed up a flight of stairs to the roof. 

When Falco reached the roof, he breathed a sigh of relief for the fact that he had gotten away from the craziness of the party before on of the girls there decided to hit on him, which would’ve been awkward for him since he wouldn’t have known how to put her down gently. As he leaned against the railing on the balcony, Falco wondered if it had been a mistake coming here. For all his talk of going out and experiencing new things, Falco realized that truthfully, he just didn’t find this sort of thing fun. He didn’t understand how anyone could have fun while being not in their own right mind as they have unprotected sex with complete strangers. 

Falco realized that he must be old fashioned, since he seemed to prefer simpler things like playing a simple game, or having a normal conversation about something he liked with one of his friends instead of drinking, drug abuse, and fornication. Falco also found himself wondering where Gabi was right about now. He wondered if she was downstairs drinking, or making out with some stranger that she hadn’t met before, or…

“Couldn’t stand the noise either huh,” A familiar voice called from behind him. 

Falco turned around to see Gabi standing in the doorway with a cup of fruit punch in her hand. Judging from how well she was composed, Falco decided that she hadn’t been drinking tonight. 

Falco shrugged. “Just getting some fresh air, that’s all.” 

Gabi walked up to where Falco was standing and leaned against the railing along with him. “Beautiful night huh,” She said. 

“Sure is,” He agreed. They stood there looking up in the night sky for a while before Gabi broke Falco out of his thoughts. “Hey, thanks for liking my costume. I was so sure that it was garbage that I was planning on burning it when I got home.” 

“Are you kidding, your uniform looks like one of the best costumes I’ve seen tonight.” Falco meant it too. He wasn’t into the creepy horror stuff that everyone was wearing downstairs, so naturally he liked Gabi’s simpler costume the most. 

Gabi smiled. “God, you are always such a gentleman aren’t you. I mean, c’mon, this outfit is comedy gold, and you’re not making any rude comments about it. It’s why I like hanging out with you, you know that.” 

Falco felt oddly pleased by her calling him a gentleman. Of course, it made him feel a little bad since for the last few minutes he had noticed that due to the tightness of her costume, her breasts were sticking out more than usual. It felt shameful to him, the fact that she was complimenting him, and here he was checking out her breasts. 

Falco turned away from her, trying to hide his embarrassment.” Well, I wouldn’t know if I’m as nice as you say I am.” 

“Dude, what the fuck is wrong with you.” Gabi gave him a little knock on the head with her fist causing him to recoil a little. “You are literally one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. You always hold the door for me when we walk in places, you haven’t said one unkind thing in all the time I’ve known you, and when we watched the Broncos several weeks ago, you carried up two-thirds of my groceries up to my place for me.” Gabi lowered her voice and continued in a more quiet tone. “I mean, God knows you’re a better person than I am.” 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Falco held up his hands in deference. “Gabi, c’mon, I don’t know you all that well, but I can tell that you’re a really good person. I mean, Udo and Zophia are always singing praises of you. You always have a positive and upbeat attitude. And not once since we met have you teased me for being a boring, uncool loner who doesn’t like to have any fun at all.” 

“Well why would I want you to change who you are just to conform to my image of what I think all people should be? Besides, I like you just the way you are. You’re a nice, quiet guy, who is really easy to get along with. Why would I want you to be anything else?” 

“You see, Gabi,” Falco extended his hand in Gabi’s direction. “That’s what I mean. You’re a nice person who doesn’t give a shit about how I behave. Quite frankly, I think that anyone would want to be your friend. And I’m sure your parents must be proud to have raised a kid like you.” 

Falco noticed a mixed look of shock, sadness, and pain shoot across Gabi’s face when he mentioned her parents. She just crossed her arms across her waist, and stood there silently for a while, making Falco realize that he had said something wrong. 

“Gabi,” Falco tried breaking her out of her thoughts. “Gabi, are you all right? Did I say something…?” 

“No,” Gabi waved her hand dismissively. “No, you’re fine. It’s just, um, my parents died when I was five, that’s all.”

That took Falco aback a little. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” he stammered out the words as fast as he could, realizing that he may have struck a nerve with her. 

“It’s okay,” Gabi shrugged. “You didn’t know,” 

“How did they die? If you don’t mind me asking,”

“Car accident,” 

“Oh, I’m sorry.” 

“Yeah, me to,” 

They stood there in awkward silence for a while before Falco broke the tension by asking. “So where did you live after they died?” 

“All around really, I started by living with my aunt for a few years. But then she had a complete mental breakdown, and she had to be committed. I then went to live with my cousin for a few years, but then he died too. After he died, I had no one and no where to go too (well, except for an uncle who lives in Minnesota, but he didn’t want anything to do with me). So I would probably been sent off to foster care, but one of my cousins friends convinced her parents to take me in instead.” 

“They sound like really good people.” 

“Oh they are just the greatest. Better than I ever deserved. They didn’t have to take me in, but they did. They gave me the first stable home that had had in a while, and they treated me like I was their daughter. Hell, whenever they introduce me to other people, they refer to me as family. They even had me in every one of there Christmas cards every year, that’s how much they cared about me.”

It shocked Falco to hear that the person that he always assumed was so carefree actually carried a lot of weight to her. But it did give him a lot more respect for her, hearing about all the things that she has to go through when she was younger. 

“Well you know what Gabi; you really did deserve to have such amazing people look after you. And I mean it, by the way.

“Thank you for saying that,” Gabi wiped a few tears out of her eyes. “Hey Falco, I think you should know that the only reason that I came to this party, was because Zophia told me that you were going to be here.” 

Falco couldn’t help but laugh at the irony of that statement. “Well you know what, I only came here because Udo told me that you were going to be here tonight.” 

Gabi started laughing uncontrollably. “Oh my God really, so you don’t like the whole party scene either.” 

“No, I don’t like drinking. I don’t like bumping into people while I’m trying t dance, and I certainly don’t like having unprotected sex while strange people.” 

“Me neither, I don’t get why people like that shit. Besides, I never go to these things because I’ve heard all the horror stories about drunken frat boys raping young maidens like me at these types of parties. I, oh so very much, intend to keep my virginity until I meet some nice guy who really sweeps me off my feet, not just some random guy I meet in bar if you don’t mind.” 

“Oh,” Falco stammered. “You’re a virgin huh.” 

“Yeah, why?” Gabi asked 

“Oh, it’s just, so am I” Falco mumbled

“Oh, cool, it’s good to see that we are like minded on that as well.” 

“Yeah,” 

“Hey you know what,” Gabi roped her arm around Falco’s neck. “Let’s both agree to stick with our philosophy, and save our virginities for the right people.” 

Falco laughed a little, and pulled off Gabi’s arm. “I can agree to that.” 

Falco then brought his blue eyes up to meet Gabi’s wide brown ones, and the two found themselves starring into each others eyes for what seemed like an eternity. Neither of them had ever thought that they would ever meet people who were like minded as themselves. Falco wasn’t sure why, but he felt drawn to Gabi in a way that he had never felt towards anyone else in his life. And he had an odd feeling that Gabi felt the same way judging by how she returned the smile he was giving her, Gabi suddenly broke the moment when she pulled out her phone and said. “Hey, I’ve been meaning to give this to you for a while.” 

“What’s that?” 

“My phone number,” Gabi showed him the number on her screen. 

“Oh, right,” Falco pulled out his phone, and added GABI to his short list of contacts. When he was done he said. “Here, let me give you mine.” 

“Thank you,” Gabi smiled as she added him to her list of contacts. “Now we can talk to each other whenever one of us has a bad day at work, and we need to rant about it.” 

“Sounds good,” Falco nodded. 

And then, Falco noticed something beautiful happen. A single white snowflake landed right on Gabi’s cheek. Gabi brought her hand up to her face as she felt the wetness on her cheek. “Hey check it out,” She held out her hand. “The first snowflake of the year,” 

“I know right,” And then Falco look around to see that it was snowing all around them, creating a beautiful spectacle as they had never seen before. Winter was finally here. Within hours this whole area would be covered in snow. 

Falco turned over to look at Gabi who was just as enchanted by the snowfall as he was. He couldn’t help but notice how pretty she looked with little, white snowflakes landing in her hair. Gabi turned over to see him starring at her. Looking into her eyes, Falco smiled at her, and Gabi looked back into his eyes and smiled back. And they stood there together for a while watching the snow come down, and they couldn’t be happier than they were in each other’s company.


	8. In Which Gabi has to pee.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well here we are after yet another long update. I must be the George R. R. Martin of fanfiction. Just kidding, I'm not that talented of a writer. But if you guys see any problems with this story, please let me know since I'm always looking to improve my writing skills. I hope to update the next chapter sooner, but I make no promises.

Gabi had to pee. She had had to pee for over five hours now. It had all started out simply enough. She had come into work today drinking a large bottle of Dr Pepper as she strolled through the doors of her crowded workplace. Before she walked into her old familiar Starbucks, she had chucked the bottle into the trashcan located next to the counter and walked around to clock in. However, as she was putting on her apron, she felt the odd feeling of pressure building up in her bladder. Of course at that point it was too late to run to the bathroom so she realized that she was just going to have to hold it until she got her break. 

That had been five hours ago. The pressure in her bladder had been unbearable after the first hour, and after the second hour, it had been agonizing. Customers had been pouring in, so she hadn’t had time to even take five minutes to run to the ladies room so she could relieve herself. The worst part of it all, was the fact that having to pee made her entire day seem slower. It seemed that Gabi could check her watch, then get busy with helping some customers for what seemed like an eternity, and then check her watch again to see, to her dismay that only a few minutes had passed since she last checked. 

So here Gabi was, stuck on her register trying to ring up this one customer’s order while trying to hide the fact that she was shifting her hips from side to side to try to offset the agonizing feeling between her legs. She was quietly praying to herself that Mike would get done with whatever he was doing in the back so she could go on break. Because, quite frankly, if she didn’t relieve herself soon, she was probably going to have an accident right here in front of all the customers; and while some people might find a Starbucks employee pissing herself in front of everyone rather amusing, it was not something that Gabi wanted happening to her. The last thing Gabi’s mental state needed was an embarrassing video of her pissing her pant while on the job being uploaded and going viral with millions of people to watch her humiliation. That would probably be the thing that would make her rush into Ms Ral’s office in tears during their next session. 

“All right,” Gabi cheerily handed the customer his receipt. “Your total is going to be $5.34, and on the back of your receipt you’ll find a survey that if you complete, you’ll receive a free coffee of any size with any purchase you make. Have a good day sir.” 

The man grunted a response; rudely snatched the receipt out of her hands, and walked away to sit down on one of the tables. Gabi moaned and rolled her eyes at his behavior. The people who shopped here were all so rude to her. It seemed like no matter how hard she tried to make the many customers that she served happy, they would just reply with rudeness and nasty glares. 

Gabi figured that it might have something to do with the fact that she was a young, college student. After all, she had gotten the vibe that most of Liberio’s older inhabitants weren’t overly fond of the many students who attended Marley University. Not that she could entirely blame them though, since they must lose a lot of sleep from students going out to parties like the one that she had attended on Halloween and causing a ruckus while they were wasted. 

It felt like most of Gabi’s fellow students were only here to get drunk and party, with their studies being secondary. Gabi would walk into her classes only to find that half of her fellow students hadn’t done their assignments, and the other half were either high or hung over. Recently, Gabi’s teacher Professor Pieck Reines had to announce a new policy that any student who showed up in an inhibited mental state, would have to do mandatory workouts under supervision of Coach Galliard. Knowing what an unpleasant asshole Porco Galliard was, most of the students showed up sober the next day. Those that didn’t looked like they had served two tours of duty in Vietnam when Gabi saw them next. 

Gabi had heard of an incident that had happened over a year before she had arrived at Marley in which a food truck rally had been scheduled in town. Apparently, things had started out innocently enough with students and the people of the town going out and sampling the various products that the venders were selling. However, there were quite a few venders selling beer, which the college students drank up very quickly. Very soon the students started harassing the other pedestrians with unruly behavior, loud shouting, and ever one incident of some douchbag exposing himself to an older lady. The scene escalated when some of the students got into an argument with one of the venders about prices, and about the long wait in line that they had to endure. After a heated exchange, the students tipped over the food truck and looted it, and soon other drunken students were following their example. 

The incident made national news, and became a prime example for newscasters whenever they wanted to talk about why America’s youth sucks nowadays. Worst of all, the incident put the school in a very bad light causing Dean Magath to have to go into full blown public relations mode. Magath very forcefully expelled all students who were involved in the riot, and even helped the police track down the student who exposed himself to the old lady. Since then, Magath had also set up a standard of behaviors that he expected all students to follow on and off campus. Those who violated those policies ran the risk of being suspended. 

Gabi slipped her copy of the man’s receipt under the cash register, and walked over to the frappe machine to make the man’s order. Every step was pure agony since it felt like her bladder would explode with every step she took. It didn’t help that everything around her reminded her that she really had to pee. She could hear the sound of people in the lobby sipping water from their cups. She heard Nanaba washing her hands. And even watching the frappe machine churn the ice into liquid reminded her of the urine swishing around in her bladder. 

Desperately, she looked at her watch. It had been nearly five hours and fifteen minutes since she had clocked in, and while she usually liked a later break, if she had to wait any longer she was just going to drop what she was doing and run to the ladies room to relieve herself. After all, she knew that you could die from holding in your pee for to long. She found herself thinking about a story that she had heard about a famous Polish astronomer, who revolutionized the science of astronomy, who had died holding in his pee at some dinner party. Apparently, he hadn’t wanted to leave the table, because at the time it was considered rude to leave the table before everyone was done eating. Thinking about that made Gabi even more desperate to go to the restroom. 

Pulling the blender out of the mixer, she poured the contents into a large cup, sprayed some whip cream on top, put some chocolate drizzle and sprinkles over it, and put on the lid and called out the order. Unsurprisingly, the customer was equally as unpleasant picking up his order as he was when he was ordering it. 

As the man was walking away, Gabi heard him mumble, “Bitch,” under his breath. Gabi let out a sigh of exasperation as she started wiping down the counter. God, she just couldn’t understand why people just had to be so rude and nasty. Were their lives really so screwed up that they had to vent out their frustrations out on an innocent girl like her who was just trying there best to make them happy? Looking back, she couldn’t figure out what it was that had made the man so frustrated. After all, she had greeted him with a smile, politely taken his order, and in addition to getting his order right, she had put on a little extra chocolate drizzle to try to make him happy. Apparently it had all been for nothing since he seemed just as angry as he was before. 

“I guess you just can’t make some people happy.” 

Gabi turned over to see Nanaba wiping down one of the coffee machines. Putting her rag down, Nanaba walked over to Gabi and put her hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry about him kid. He’s just an asshole. Trust me, you can go out of your way to make customers happy, but in the end some of them just chose to be miserable. Besides, I saw what you did for him; you did a good job.” 

Gabi shrugged and moved her shoulder away from Nanaba’s hand. “Well, I do try my best. I guess it wasn’t enough though.” 

“Hey kid, don’t do that to yourself. You’re always nice to the customers. And truthfully, most of them actually like you if the surveys that mention you are correct.” 

“Really?” 

“Oh yeah, Mike and I look at all the surveys, and quite a few of them say that ‘the black haired girl named ‘Gabi’ is one of the nicest people they had ever met, and that her taking their orders was probably the best part of coming to Starbucks.’” 

Gabi smiled at the compliment. “Well, that’s really good to know.”

Nanaba nodded in agreement. “It’s good to actually appreciated sometimes. Hey, could you restock all the cups before you go on break?” Gesturing to the cups they kept under the counter. 

Gabi’s eyes lit up at the mention of her break. Finally, at long last, it was finally coming. “Yeah, I’ll get right on it,” She said as she walked over to the counter. Gabi kneeled down on the floor and started gathering up the packets of various sizes of cups that she needed to fill up. As she fumbled around, she looked up briefly to see Nanaba leaning on the counter above Gabi’s head while looking at her phone. Occasionally, Nanaba would look down at Gabi while Gabi loaded up packets of cups into her arms. Standing up, Gabi walked over to the cup holders and refilled all of them. 

When she was done, Nanaba walked over to her and said. “All right that’s good enough, you can go on break.” 

“Oh really, Mike isn’t done with his stuff yet.” Gabi hadn’t thought that she would get her break until Mike was done filling out the many forms of paper work that he had to do. 

Nanaba just shrugged. “He probably isn’t going to be done for a while, and quite frankly, you should’ve gone on break a while ago. Besides, I can hold down the fort until Flagon gets here in about ten minutes, so go ahead and go.” 

Gabi didn’t need any more prompting than that. Putting away all the things she was carrying, she quickly clocked out, and stormed out of the shop to hurry to the restroom as fast as her legs would take her. 

It was somewhat crowded in Albertsons that day, so she had to weave through crowds of customers in her mad dash to the ladies room. “Excuse me, excuse me, sorry, coming though,” She called out the various shoppers as she closely maneuvered around them. With her every step, she could feel the ache in her loins increasing. But fortunately, she could see the ladies room just up ahead. Increasing her pace, Gabi started power walking towards the bathroom entrance. 

She just so happened to spot Dot Pixis as she approached the bathroom entrance. He noticed her and nodded warmly in her direction. She smiled and waved back at him. Normally, she would’ve stopped to say hello, but she was on a time budget that included eating (since she hadn’t eaten since breakfast and she was starving.), taking a few moments to rest (since it had been very busy and she needed to recharge before she worked for another three hours.), and of course using the bathroom (for reasons stated previously.). Mr. Pixis was such a nice man though. She felt bad about casually dismissing him. 

When Gabi opened the door to the ladies room, she almost collided with an older woman who was exiting the room. Normally, she would have had a more formal apology, but since she was in a hurry, she mumbled out a quick, “Sorry,” and brushed past the old lady. The lady mumbled something nasty, and stormed out. Gabi hated to feel so rude, but at this point the only thing she was concerned with was emptying her bowels before she exploded. 

Gabi was pleased to say that Albertsons took good care of its bathrooms. The floors were always clean, the sinks always looked sanitary, none of the walls had any graffiti on them, and you could always count on not finding any pee and the toilet seats when you sat down on them. Which was nice since Gabi as something of a neat freak, and nothing turned her off from doing her business than a gross, disgusting bathroom stall. 

Gabi walked across the room checking each of the stalls, and discovered, to her dismay, that they were all occupied. “Shit,” she mumbled under her breath. She had hoped to be in and out of here, but now she was looking at a five minute wait for an open stall. So she waited for a stall to open up for what seemed like forever. She crossed her legs and wiggled around trying to feel some form of comfort as she leaned against one of the sinks. But there was little she could do to appease aching pressure building up inside her. 

Finally, just when Gabi didn’t think that she could hold it any longer, she heard the sound of a toilet flushing, and the stall farthest from the door opened up to reveal some lady and her two year old exiting the stall. They had barely stepped out when Gabi bolted past them into the now open stall. 

After rushing in and locking the door, Gabi tore off her apron, and practically threw it on the toilet head behind the seat. Afterwards, she tried to remove her pants only to discover that her belt was preventing her from removing them. “Shit, shit, shit,” she mumbled in desperation as she desperately fumbled with her belt. The more she tried to unbuckle her belt, the more it seemed to want to stay around her waist. After several failed attempts, she finally managed to unbuckle her belt. After which, she unzipped her black work pants, pulled her pants and underwear down to her ankles, and plopped down on the toilet to finally, at long last, relieve her bowels. 

Gabi felt an instant wave of relief flood her the second the urine inside her exited her body. After hours of constant, unbearable agony, she felt nothing but elation as she heard her urine spray the toilet water beneath her. She couldn’t help but let out an overly loud sigh of relief as the pressure inside her bladder subsided. When she finally finished, she sat there panting for a few moments, recovering from the intensity of her urination. She swore, she had never felt more relief in her life. Standing up, she pulled up her underwear and pants, buckled up her belt, and opened up the stall door to go wash her hands. 

The water felt warm on her hands. She was glad for that; after all, it was so cold these days that even indoors Gabi could barely feel her fingers. Reaching over to the soap dispenser, Gabi squeezed a moderate amount of soap onto her hands. She started rubbing the soap vigorously on her hands, determined to get every speck of filth off. It felt good when her hands were clean. Some days it felt like they could never be clean enough. She stared down at the sink, never taking her gaze off her soapy hands. 

As she lathered them, she suddenly felt unwanted memories creeping into her mind. All of a sudden, she wasn’t in the ladies room at Albertson’s. She was twelve years old holding her hands over the kitchen sink in Reiner’s house. She could feel Sasha washing her hands for her as she tried to calmly assure Gabi that everything was fine. 

“Its okay sweetheart,” Sasha told her in a calm reassuring voice, though Gabi could hear huge amounts of uncertainty in her voice. “Everything’s going to be fine, okay.” Twelve year old Gabi looked up to see that Sasha was smiling; however, she could clearly see that Sasha was trying desperately to keep her shit together as well. Before Gabi could look farther back past Sasha, Sasha took her head and pointed it in the direction of the sink. “No, no,” Sasha told her, her voice filled with a sort of sad sweetness. “Don’t look in the living room; don’t look in that direction at all, okay. Just focus on getting these filthy hands of yours clean, alright. Gabi looked down at her hands only to see that they were covered in blood. Vast waves of red poured down into the sink below like the Nile River when Moses turned it all into blood. And then, Gabi looked up to see her reflection in the kitchen window only to discover, to her horror, that the majority of her face, from her hair line to her chin, was covered in thick, red blood! 

Her mind suddenly snapping back to the present, Gabi tore away from the sink gasping for breath. Desperately, she looked in the mirror to see if there was any blood on her face, and discovered, to her relief, that there was not. She looked down at her hands and found that they were as clean as ever. 

Gabi leaned her elbows against the sink and tried to slow her rapid breathing down. God, she didn’t need this crap in her life. Not after she had worked so hard to move on from the events of that day. She wasn’t going crazy, she was fine. She was going to graduate from college with honors, get a good, high paying job in radiology, and have a long, happy life. She wasn’t going to go insane and get locked in a asylum like Aunt Karina did. Everything was going to be fine. 

Gabi then realized that some other ladies were staring at her. They must’ve noticed her erratic behavior, and were probably a little freaked out by it. Giving them all a reassuring smile, she dried off her hands and moved to exit the ladies room. As she exited, she could feel the nervous stares of the many ladies, who probably assumed that she was having a meltdown, watching her as the door closed behind her. 

The break room always smelled like turpentine, and that was on good days. In the summer when it got hot, Gabi could swear that she smelled mold growing in the walls. As Gabi entered the break room, she looked around to see the old familiar sights. She could see exposed areas in the walls were insulation was leaking out. When she looked up, she could see exposed wires running across the ceiling in clumps that made her messy hair look organized. They had never put tile on the floor, so Gabi could see multiple paints stains checkering the concrete floor. 

Sighing, Gabi walked across the room to her tiny locker to get her lunch. Inserting her key into the keyhole, she opened her locker and pulled out her lunch bag. The break room had three cheap, plastic tables, and the only seats they had were cheap, folding chairs that felt like they were going to collapse when you sat on them. Gabi picked out the safest looking chair, and sat down on it. The chair creaked like it was going to give out on her, but held out all the same. 

Gabi shifted through her lunch, pulling out her baloney sandwich, her banana, her water bottle, and a bag of nacho cheese Doritos. She hadn’t eaten in over seven hours so she was extremely famished. After setting down some napkins over the dirty table, she started tearing into her sandwich with intense vigor. After a few bites, she opened up her Doritos and alternated between her sandwich and her chips. Feeling thirsty, she opened up her water bottle and took a huge gulp of water. 

However, as she was putting the lid back on the top of the bottle, she accidentally knocked over her bag of chip with her elbow, spilling the contents all over the gross, looking concrete floor. “Shit,” she mumbled as she reached down to try to salvage what was left of her snack. While she managed to save a few chips, the rest were spread out all over the concrete floor. And since she had no idea how clean the floor was, there was no way in hell she was going to eat anything that had fallen on that floor. 

Grumbling, Gabi bent over to scoop up the remaining chips that were littered all over the floor. It pained her to know that $3.49 worth of Doritos had just gone down the drain. Money was tight, and her food budget was small enough already. Now here she had gone and spilled half of her lunch on the floor. She only hoped that what remained of her lunch would fill her up until dinner. 

Upon finishing what remained of her chips, Gabi put her hand under her chin and sighed. This day had been miserable, and it kept getting worse. Last night, she had another devil nightmare. She couldn’t really remember what it had been about, just that it had involved horrible little creatures trying to get her, and worst of all Reiner’s lifeless body looking down at her. She had awoken to find her pajamas and bed sheets covered in sweat, practically soaking them. 

The dreams were getting worse by the night, and it was getting to the point where Gabi was becoming afraid to go to sleep at night. And because her sleep was so fitful, she was getting more tired with every passing day. Between lack of sleep and her busy schedule, Gabi felt like she was going to collapse at any given moment. Even as she was sitting here eating, she could barely keep her eyes open. 

Taking another sip of water, she started on her sandwich again. Gabi wondered if she should talk to Petra again soon. Of course, if she told Petra about how bad her condition really was, Petra would undoubtedly tell Sasha and her family, which would lead to them freaking out. And quite frankly, Gabi really didn’t want the Brause family worrying about her since they had enough to worry about as it was. 

Gabi heard the door open and shut, and she looked up from her lunch to see Nanaba walk in. Nanaba looked like she was exhausted judging by how she lumbered over to the table Gabi was sitting on. Moaning, Nanaba sat down on a seat opposite of her. Gabi watched as Nanaba pulled her phone and a can of Red Bull out of the bag she was carrying. Setting her phone on the table, Nanaba opened the can with a fisss, and took one large gulp of the substance. Turning to Gabi, she asked. “Enjoying your break?” 

Gabi nodded in response. 

“Good,” said Nanaba as she turned back to her phone. 

“Are you off?” asked Gabi. 

“Unfortunately no,” Nanaba sighed. “I still have five more hours to go, which sucks since I opened today, but that’s being a manager for you.” 

“Yeah,” Gabi nodded in agreement. After taking another sip from her water bottle, Gabi finished off her sandwich. Feeling the combined fatigue of sleepless nights and a long day at work, Gabi leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes trying to rest a bit before she went back to work. 

“Tired huh kid,” Nanaba asked her. 

“Yeah,” Gabi agreed. “Long day at work, that’s all,” 

“Really,” Nanaba pointed in the direction of her face. “There are dark circles under your eyes. You look like you haven’t been sleeping.” 

Gabi smiled somewhat insincerely and shook her head. “Yeah, I didn’t sleep well last night. But it’s not that bad. I’m fine.” 

“Are you sure?” Nanaba gave her a puzzled look. “Because for the last few days you’ve seemed a little out of it; is everything all right?” 

Gabi really didn’t want her boss, or anyone for that matter, knowing about her personal problems, so she smiled again and tried dismissing Nanaba’s concerns. “I’ve just been a little tired lately. I’m fine.” 

Raising her eyebrow, Nanaba asked. “You’re sure there’s nothing you want to talk about.” 

“Nope,” Gabi shook her head. “I’m fine.” 

“Okay,” Nanaba nodded. Nanaba seemed to lose interest and started drinking her Red Bull again. Gabi thought that she was in the clear, and let her guard down. She started taking another drink of water when Nanaba asked her. “So do your sleepless nights have anything to do with those scars on your shoulder?” 

Gabi spat out the water in her mouth in shock. How had Nanaba seen those? Gabi had always been so careful to hide them from everyone. As far as she knew, the only people who knew about the scars on her shoulder were Sasha and her family, and Petra. Then Gabi realized that Nanaba must’ve seen them when she was restocking the cups under the counter. Gabi had been bending over, and Nanaba had been directly above her. She must’ve been able to look down Gabi’s shirt and see the slightly exposed scars crisscrossing her left shoulder blade like a grotesque star. 

“It’s nothing, I swear.” Gabi stammered, her eyes darting back and forth as she tried to find some way out of this conversation. Her right hand instinctively reaching under her collar to feel the horrid scars she had inflicted on herself with the pocket knife Mr. Brause had given her for her fourteenth birthday. “I haven’t cut myself since my senior year in high school. And even then it wasn’t that often, just a few times a month maybe.” Gabi could feel fear and embarrassment growing inside her. “I promise you, I’m not crazy, or depressed. I’m not going to flip out in front of a customer or…” 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, kid, calm down,” Nanaba cut in. “You’re not in any trouble, okay. I actually know what you’re going though, see.” Nanaba rolled back the long sleeve shirt that she always wore under her uniform. To Gabi’s astonishment, she saw that Nanaba’s entire arm from wrist to elbow was covered in rows of ugly, self inflicted scars. 

“See kid,” Nanaba rolled her sleeve back down. “You’re not alone in that regard.” 

“Why did you do it?” Gabi quietly asked. 

Nanaba took a long sip of Red Bull before answering. “Well you see kid; my father was a drunk, abusive piece of shit. Every night he would come home from the factory he worked at, drunk as a skunk. Once he was home, he would start beating the crap out of my mother and I, until he got tired of it and collapsed into bed. Afterwards, my mother and I would crawl into our rooms to lick our wounds and the whole cycle would repeat the next day. Then when I was ten, my mother decided that she had enough so she took a whole bunch of Tylenol and killed herself.” 

“Holy shit,” Gabi had no idea that her manager had this much crap going on in her life. It made her crap look almost like nothing in compared to Nanaba’s crap. 

“So after that, he started venting all of his frustrations out on me whenever he was home, which, after he lost his job, were all the time. So I started to blame myself for everything that he did to me, and the only way I could feel better was by cutting myself.” Nanaba took a long sip of her drink before continuing. “Then, when I was sixteen, I finally ran away from home. I wandered around for a while, before I wound here in town. I didn’t have any money, so I was homeless and living on the streets. Until one night, I was sleeping on a park bench all covered in newspapers desperately trying to keep myself warm, when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to see Mike staring at me. He offered me a place to stay for the night and I eagerly accepted. The next morning, He offered me a job here at his store. I didn’t have any other prospects, so I took him up on his offer. Cut to ten years later, and her I am as assistant manager of Mike’s Starbucks.” 

Gabi was shocked by Nanaba’s revelation. She had never known any of this, and was surprised that Nanaba was even telling her any of this. Before she could say anything, Nanaba asked “So what about you kid, what’s your story?” 

“I…” Gabi stammered unsure about what to say. Nanaba had just told her all of her nasty secrets, so shouldn’t she tell Nanaba her story. But before she could decide, Nanaba cut her off. “Hey, you know what; you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. God knows I never talked to anyone about all this before I met Mike. So if your not comfortable talking about whatever it is that caused you to self harm, you don’t have to.” 

Gabi breathed a sigh of relief, since she really wasn’t comfortable sharing her sad past with someone that she only considered a coworker. “Thank you,” She said. 

“No problem,” Nanaba threw her empty can of Red Bull in a nearby trash can. “I know that the past can be hard to deal with sometimes, and I want you to know that if you ever ant to talk about it, I’ll be here for you.” 

“That’s good to know,” Gabi still didn’t feel secure enough to talk about all her issues with any one really. 

Gabi and Nanaba sat in silence for a few moments before Nanaba asked. “Hey kid, are you a virgin?” 

‘Yes,” Gabi dryly replied. She was used to other women asking her about her nonexistent sex life, and getting surprised when they found out that a girl her age had never had sex in her life. “And I really don’t plan on changing that any time soon, thank you.” 

“Good,” Nanaba surprised her by agreeing with her. “Men are pigs. Take it from me; I wasn’t as smart as you were when I was a teenager. I was screwing every guy who looked my way. They all figured out that I was vulnerable, so they all took advantage of me. So yeah kid, be smart, do have sex with random guys you meet. If you have to go your whole life without having sex, you’ll be fine.” 

“Thanks for the advice,” Though Gabi didn’t need to know the gross details of her boss’s sex life. After all, between Udo and Zophia she had enough gross stuff to deal with at home already. 

“No problem kid,” Nanaba pulled out a pack of cigarettes, and stood up to go outside and smoke. “Well, see you back out there.” 

“See you later,” Gabi replied. 

Before Nanaba left the break room, she turned to Gabi and said. “Hey you know kid; you really should find someone to talk to about this stuff. Because I can see that you’re not comfortable talking to me about this, so find someone that you’re feel comfortable opening up to. Trust me, it really helps.

Gabi gave a curt nod in response. Giving Gabi one last smile, Nanaba walked out through the door leaving Gabi alone with her thoughts. 

Sharing her feelings was not something that Gabi was comfortable with. Of course she had Zophia and Sasha, but she hardly saw Sasha anymore, and Zophia was always hanging out with Udo. It occurred to Gabi that she was going to be alone tonight, since Zophia was going out on a date with Udo. While she was happy that Zophia was having fun, it sucked because it got kind of lonely in her apartment after a while. If only there was someone else she could hang out with tonight to make the night less lonely. 

Then it occurred to her, there was someone who was in the same boat with her who might also like some company today. Smiling, she pulled out her phone, and scrolled down her list of contact until she found the number that Falco had given her on Halloween. The phone rang for a while, and Gabi became a little worried that he wouldn’t pick up. But then she heard Falco’s voice over the speaker. 

“Hello,” He asked. 

“Hey Falco, it’s me.” Gabi replied in a cheery manner. 

“Oh, hey Gabi, what’s up?” 

“I was just wondering. Udo and Zophia are going out tonight and I though if you’re not doing anything, that maybe we could hang out tonight.”

Falco was quiet for a moment before replying. “Yeah, that sounds like fun. I’m not doing anything at all tonight. Do you want to come over to my place?” 

“Yeah sure,” Gabi replied. “I’ve never been to your place before. Where is it at.?” 

Falco gave her directions, and fortunately it wasn’t to far away. “Alright,” Gabi said. “I get off work at four, so I’ll see you at around 4:15 P.M. okay.” 

“Sounds good, I’ll see you then, Bye,” 

The call ended. Gabi couldn’t help but feel a little bit of excitement. After all, she always had lots of fun with Falco. So the remainder of the day would probably be a lot of fun. 

Upon checking her watch, Gabi realized that her break was almost over, and she needed to get back to work putting her things back in her locker, she left the break room for another three hours of work. After clocking back in and putting on her apron, Gabi realized that she had to pee again.


	9. In Which Gabi and Falco get to know each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I hated this chapter at first, but I really liked how it came out. Chapter 124 of the manga was a great Gabi chapter, though I hope Connie comes to his senses. Till next time.

_The snow fell all around him covering the whole area in a never ending sea of white. There was a dense gray fog surrounding him,impairing his vision so that he couldn't see anything ten feet away from him. As he looked around,he could see the dim lights from the many windows in the surrounding buildings. He knew where he was though, that was how dreams worked after all. He was on top of the roof of the building where the Halloween party had been held all those weeks ago._

_He wasn't alone either. Turning to his left, he Gabi standing next to him. She was wearing that make shift soldiers uniform that she had worn as a costume to the party. There were little white flakes of snow covering her hair making her look especially cute in the pale moonlight. She turned over and smiled at him causing him to smile back at her. Slowly, she walked over to him and started caressing his chest. He moaned a little as she started stimulating parts of him that he didn't know could be stimulated. He looked down and saw that she unbuttoning the lower buttons of her uniform exposing her belly button. Gently, she took his hand and stuck it under her uniform making him feel greatly aroused. Then, she slowly started leaning her face towards his, bringing their lips close enough to touch. And then, she leaned forward and..._

KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK,

Falco woke up to the sound of someone knocking on his door. Looking around, he realized that he had fallen asleep on his couch while working on his schoolwork. Yesterday had been a long day at work. He hadn’t gotten home until late at night after working a ten hour shift, and once he went to bed he didn’t get any sleep. Fortunately, he had been off today so he didn’t have to worry about having to go to work tired, but unfortunately for him, he had been drowsing off and on all day due to getting only four hours of sleep.

Then at one in the afternoon, he had received a phone call from Gabi asking if he wanted to hang out with her. Now Falco had been extremely tired and didn’t feel like going anywhere, but the opportunity to be with Gabi was too much to pass up. So, since he didn’t feel like going anywhere, he invited her over to his place. After he had ended the call, Falco had spent the last two hours cleaning his small apartment, determined not to look like a slob to Gabi. After which, he sat down on the couch to do some homework before she arrived, but ended up falling asleep instead.

Realizing that it must be Gabi knocking at his door, Falco hurried over to the door to open it. He couldn’t help but feel a little embarrassed since he didn’t know how long Gabi had been waiting for him to open the door for her, but hopefully she hadn’t been waiting to long.

After all, Falco had been looking forward to this all day, and he didn’t want Gabi to think that he was rude or anything. Over the past few weeks since the Halloween party, Falco had found himself pleasantly thinking about Gabi more and more. He would have imaginary conversations with her about various topics while he was at work, He would ask Udo if Zophia had mentioned anything about Gabi to him, and every now and then he would check his phone to see if she had texted him or anything. He wasn’t sure why, but Falco really thought that he had bonded with Gabi that night. Deep down, he had the feeling that she didn’t usually share that much information about herself with anyone, particularly the truth about her parents.

Falco really felt sorry for her. He couldn’t even imagine what it had been like growing up without her parents, and he definitely couldn’t imagine what it had been like being shuffled around from one family member to another all the time. Falco had grown up in a very stable home with his parents and his older brother, and the only thing he really had to worry about were bullies at school. Gabi, on the other hand, must’ve had to worry all the time. It must’ve been really scary knowing that the people who were supposed to take care of you until you were eighteen weren’t there for you. Not to mention how hard it must’ve been for Gabi to know that her parents had missed all the important moments of her life.

A wave of cool air hit Falco when he opened the door. His dorm complex kept the heat in the hallways low as a way of saving money. Because of that, leaving your dorm room to go into the hallway could be like going from Florida to Minnesota in a matter of seconds.

Gabi was waiting for him on the other side of the door. Falco felt an odd feeling of joy wash over him when he saw her. He could see that she had just left work judging from her Starbucks uniform under her jacket. She had a large, orange and grey back pack that was covered in snow slung around her shoulder .Her work pants and shoes were covered in some sort of stains that he could only assume were coffee stains. When he looked at her face, he could see that it had clearly been a long day at work from the dark circles under her eyes, and from how disarrayed her hair was.

“Hey,” Gabi greeted him, clearly sounding fatigued.

“Hey,” Falco greeted back smiling at her. “Come on in,” Falco stepped aside and ushered her through his door. Gabi let out a sigh of fatigue as she walked in. Falco could tell that she was clearly exhausted from whatever she had worked today. Kicking off her shoes, Gabi turned to Falco and said. “Hey, do you mind if I use your bathroom to change? I keep a spare change of clothes in my backpack.”

“Yeah,” Falco gestured towards the bathroom down the hall. “Go on ahead.”

“Thanks,” Gabi quickly headed over to the bathroom leaving Falco alone in his living room. Falco figured that she would be a while, so he took a seat on the couch while he waited. As he waited, Falco started clearing all his schoolwork off the couch and on to the coffee table since he assumed that Gabi would probably want to sit down when she got out of the bathroom.

While he was doing that, it occurred to him that he didn’t actually know what it was he and Gabi were going to do once she came out. He realized that while he had spent quite a bit of time with Gabi, he really didn’t know what it was that she liked to do. He knew that she liked the Marvel movies and exercising, but that was about it. Now Falco started to worry that this whole situation could turn awkward very quickly if he and Gabi ran out of subjects to talk about in an hour, and neither of them knew what to do for fun afterwards. They might play video games on the Xbox console that Colt had sent him for his birthday last year, but he wasn’t sure if she would like any of the few games he had. He wondered what she liked to watch on TV, and if she would like to watch any of the shows he liked. If not, maybe they could watch something that she liked instead.

As he sat there, Falco heard the sound of Gabi fumbling her clothes around in the bathroom. It was then that he came to the realization that Gabi was probably wearing nothing but her underwear in his bathroom. All of a sudden, Falco felt really hot even though it was kind of cold in his small apartment. Falco could picture Gabi pulling off her work shirt revealing her bra to the mirror, and then sliding off her stained pants down to the floor leaving her almost completely bare. Falco could feel his groin aching in pleasure as countless arousing images filled his head causing his breathing to increase dramatically.

The pleasure faded and was quickly replaced by guilt when Falco realized that once again he was having sexual thoughts about a girl who probably thought of him as no more than her friend. While yes Falco thought Gabi was attractive, that didn’t give him the right to fanaticize about her while she was changing only a few feet away from him. Falco groaned and ran his hands through his hair; he knew that this was completely inappropriate of him. If his mother had ever known about these thoughts, she would have had good reason to be completely ashamed of him. And he knew that if Gabi knew what he was thinking right now, she would call him a pervert, storm out to report him to campus authorities, and probably never speak to him again.

The sound of the toilet flushing, followed by the bathroom door opening and shutting ripped Falco out of his guilty thoughts. Falco looked over his shoulder to his right to see Gabi fixing her messy pony tail as she walked out of the bathroom. Instead of her work uniform she was wearing a simple, grey hoodie accompanied by a pair of blue jeans and white socks. Falco smiled at the sight of her since he thought that she looked cute in her simple get up as opposed to the more complex attire he had seen other girls wear.

Um,” Falco stammered. “Care to sit down,” Falco gestured to the now open seat on his right. Gabi nodded as she finished tying up her hair; after which, Gabi collapsed on the seat next to him, kicked up her feet on his old, cheap coffee table, laid back, and let out a tired groan.

“Thanks for letting me use your bathroom,” Gabi said. “I’ve had to pee all day.”

“No problem,” Falco replied.

Gabi still looked like she was barely awake as she lay there on the couch eyes half open.

“Tired huh,” Falco asked.

“Oh God yes,” Gabi groaned. “I didn’t sleep at all last night, and I had to get up early to go to work today. And, of course, it was busy today, so I didn’t get my break until late today. So yeah, I’m running on fumes here, so don’t expect me to be good company today.”

Falco discovered that he could sympathize with that. “I understand perfectly. I worked a ten hour shift late last night, and I didn’t get any sleep either. So basically, I’ve been dozing off and on all day until you showed up.”

“Oh shit,” Gabi shot up out of her reclined position. “Did I wake you up? Is that why you took so long to answer that door?” Gabi seemed very concerned that she may have disturbed his light slumber with her arrival.

“No, no,” Falco shook his head as he lied to her. He didn’t want to upset her since it seemed to bother her quite a bit. “I was just cleaning up the place before you came that’s all.”

Gabi nodded and took a look around the apartment which was basically a replica of hers only for boys because all the designs of the dorms in Marley were the same. “Well you did a good job alright. I mean, God knows your place is cleaner than mine.” Gabi extended her arm to the neat and tidy area between the couch and the TV.

Falco smiled at the compliment. It felt extremely satisfying hearing Gabi saying something good about him. “Well thank you,” He happily replied. “I didn’t want you coming over to a nasty mess or anything like that.”

Gabi gave him a warm smile and nodded in acknowledgement. “Well that was very nice of you. It looks great by the way.”

“Thank you again,” Falco said.

They exchanged small talk for about twenty minutes, talking about work and school and how their mutual friends and roommates were doing right now. After they ran out of fresh horror stories about work, they settled into an awkward lull as they tried to figure out what to talk about.

Falco could clearly feel the awkward tension growing between him and Gabi since neither of them had been together without something to do for to long. He wondered what it was he should talk about. He was curious to learn more about her family, but decided that asking about that wouldn’t be something she was comfortable with. So ultimately, he decided to steer clear if that topic for now.

Fortunately for him, Gabi broke the silence by clearing her throat and asking. “So, do you like Game of Thrones?”

Falco felt relieved that she had broken that tension between them. “Yeah, I mean, I’ve never seen the whole show, just scenes on Youtube is all. Besides, my mom would’ve never let me see it as a kid anyway. But once I moved to college I read the books and I really liked them.”

“Hmm,” Gabi pulled one of her legs up to her chin. “I never read the books, but I watched the first four seasons at Zophia’s house when we were in high school because that Brauses didn’t have HBO but her mom did. I really liked the first four seasons, but, I’ve got to say, the fifth season kind of threw me off a little.”

It seemed to Falco that he and Gabi had something in common. “That’s probably because that was the season that the show runners started deviating from the source material, and pretty much started doing their own thing.”

“Really,”

“Oh God yes,” Falco sat up in his seat to look at Gabi directly. “They ruined the Winterfell plot arch by having Sansa as Ramsey’s victim, they butchered Stannis’s character by cutting out his entire successful northern campaign, and don’t even get me started about Dorne. They completely wasted the actor who played Doran Martell by only giving him about ten minutes of screen time before killing him off stupidly, in a way that would never work in the books, in this last season. Literally, the only good stuff in season five was Tyrion and Jorah Mormont hanging out together. ”

Gabi took a moment to think about what he had just said before responding. “Yeah, the whole Dorne plot was pretty boring and forced, and yeah, I think I know the actor you’re talking about. He played the doctor in Deep Space Nine, right?”

Falco nodded.

“He’s been really good in everything I’ve seen him in. A pity that they wasted him though, Doran Martell seemed like an interesting character. ”

“Oh he was trust me.” Falco agreed.

“Hey, what was all that other stuff you were talking about? Like the stuff with Stannis, and what did the books do differently with Sansa?”

Falco could see that Gabi seemed pretty interested in the events that had happened in the books, so he gave her a brief run down of what had happened in the books starting with Stannis’s northern campaign, and then the swapping of Jeyne Poole for Sansa in the show. Gabi listened intently, and seemed genuinely interested in the things he was saying. After he was done ranting, she cleared her throat and asked. “Wait, you said that Jon Snow was the one who gave Stannis the good advice on how to take the North, and even gave him guides to show him how to get to the mountain clans.”

“Yeah,”

Gabi seemed a bewildered by his description of Jon’s choices in the books. “Well. Isn’t that technically a violation of his vows? I mean, he literally just gave this guy aid in retaking his kingdom even though the Night’s Watch isn’t supposed to take sides in conflicts like this.”

Falco thought about it for a moment and realized that she was right. “Yeah, I never really thought about it like that before, but yeah you’re right. Jon’s not really that smart in the books like he is in the show.”

“Well duh,” Gabi leaned back with a amused expression on her face. “He knows nothing, remember.”

Falco chuckled at that little inside joke about Game of Thrones, and soon Gabi joined him. After laughing for a short moment, Gabi sat up and said. “I might have to read the books because all that stuff you just told me sounds more interesting than what the show is doing right now.”

“Well I own all the books.” Falco got up, walked into his room, and came out a minute later with all five of a Song of Ice and Fire books in his hands. “I could loan them to you, and you could give them back when you’re done with them.” Falco extended all the books in his hands towards Gabi thinking that she was about to take them.

To his surprise, she recoiled at his offering, and seemed a bit nervous about taking his gift. “Hey,” Gabi raised her hands in protest. “I can’t take those. Those are your only copies, and I don’t want to lose them or anything.”

“Seriously Gabi,” Falco offered her the books again. “It’s fine. I’m sure that you won’t let anything happen to them. And if not, you can get me new ones for Christmas as a way of making up for it.”

Gabi hesitated a bit more before deciding to take the books he offered in her hands. “Wow, that’s very generous of you, giving away your entire collection to someone you’ve only known a few months.” Gabi looked over each book before putting them in her backpack. “I’ll give them back, I promise. And if I damage any of them, I’ll pay for it, I swear. By the way, when will you want them back?”

Falco held up his hands and smiled. “Just give them back when you’re done, okay.”

“Deal,” When Gabi was done putting away her new books; she pulled out her phone and said. “Hey, when I was walking over here, I was wondering what we were going to do when I got here. I realized that I didn’t have any clue as what you liked to do, but I realized that we must both like music so I figured that it would be fun to share what music we like.”

Truthfully Falco wasn’t much of a music person since his mother had banned most music from the house when he was growing up, and he didn’t care for most of worship stuff that she liked. But he was sort of curious to see what it was that Gabi liked to listen to, and who knows, maybe he would like it to.

“Okay,” Falco sat back down on the couch. “What have you got?”

Gabi smiled and scooted closer to Falco. So close that she was starting to give him some personal space issues. But oddly enough, He found that he didn’t mind her close proximity to him. He liked the heat that came off her body making him unable to feel the cold in the room around them. He liked the smell of vanilla shampoo in her hair making her smell lovely. And he liked being able to gaze at all the little cute features in her face making him feel strange and lightheaded.

“Alright,” Gabi smiled as she plugged in her headphones to her phone, put one in her ear, and then abruptly jammed the other one into his ear making him cringe in discomfort. “This is my favorite band in the whole wide world,” Pulling her phone up to his face to show him the icon on the screen. “Disturbed,”

Falco cringed when he saw the album cover. The band’s image was that of some monstrous looking demon thing that looked like it had come form the pits of hell. He knew for a fact that his mother would’ve grounded him if he had ever brought home a CD like that. But Gabi seemed to want him to listen to it, and he was curious to hear what was on this creepy looking album, so he decided to give it a go. “Okay, let’s hear it then.” He said getting into a more comfortable sitting position slightly away from Gabi’s lack of personal space.

“This song,” Gabi scrolled up to a particular song. “Is called the Vengeful One, It’s one of my favorites so that’s what we’ll start with. You ready?”

Falco nodded.

Gabi hit the play button and a loud burst of music hit Falco so hard that it felt like his eardrum had shattered. “Agh,” he cried out. “Could you turn it down please?” He begged.

Gabi must have liked to listen to her music loud because she didn’t seem affected by it at all. But when she heard Falco cry out for mercy, she quickly turned it down. “Better,” she asked.

“Yes,” Falco replied.

Falco listened to the song the whole way through and discovered, to his pleasure, that he actually liked it. The tune, while loud, was good, and the singer had a great voice. All in all, it was a pretty good song, and he wouldn’t have minded hearing more of their songs.

When the song was over, Gabi took out their ear buds allowing Falco to massage his discomforted ear. “So, what did you think.” Asked Gabi, she seemed to really want to know whether or not he liked it.

Falco took a few moments to think about his answer. “Yeah, I liked it.” Falco scratched the back of his head. “it sounded really good, and the singer had a great voice. But you know what it made me think of?”

“Uh huh,” Gabi eagerly awaited his answer.

“The Spectre from DC comics,”

Gabi thought about it for a minute. “You mean the guy in the green cloak and underwear right.”

“Yeah, that’s the guy,” Falco explained further. “Think about it, ‘the hand of God’, ‘the dark messiah’, doesn’t that perfectly describe him.”

A look of realization hit Gabi’s face as she realized that he was right. “Wow, I never thought about it that way before. I guess you’re right since in the comics Spectre was an angel who God turned into a spirit of vengeance for rebelling against him.”

“Right,” Falco acknowledged. “His host was once Green Lantern if I recall correctly.”

“Yeah,” Gabi laughed. “He was a really weird hero wasn’t he?”

“Yeah, he was.” Falco laughed back.

Gabi leaned back on the couch and thought for a second before continuing. “You know, we really haven’t seen him in recent comics since they started the New 52. I wonder what happened to him.”

Falco shrugged and leaned back next to her bringing their heads parallel to each other. “I don’t know. Maybe DC decided that he was too weird for them to keep around which sucks since he was an interesting and powerful character.”

“Maybe,” Gabi took her phone again and scrolled through some more songs in her library. “Hey, do you want to listen to some more?” She asked him.

Falco couldn’t say no, so he listened to several more for over half an hour and liked most of them though he noted that some of Disturbed’s songs sounded that same. After a while, he realized that it was almost time for dinner, and he didn’t have anything planned. When the song they were on was finished, he excused himself from Gabi, got up and walked over to his small kitchen to try to figure out something that he and Gabi could eat together. As he searched, he noticed that Gabi was behind him looking over his shoulder. He rummaged through his cupboards for a while before Gabi proposed. “You know, we could just order a pizza and split the bill. I wouldn’t mind.”

That actually sounded good to Falco since his cooking skills weren’t the best, and he didn’t want to poison Gabi or anything. “Sounds good to me,” He sighed in relief.

In the end they called Dominos and ordered a pizza one half pepperoni the other half onions, sausage, and artichokes. Falco discovered that Gabi had weird tastes in pizza. While they waited for their food to arrive, Falco watched Gabi browse through the small bookshelf where he and Udo kept what was mostly Udo’s books. As Gabi was looking over a collection of H. P. Lovecraft stories that Udo was particularly fond of, she noticed a picture of Falco and his family resting on one of the shelves. Carefully taking the picture in her hands, she asked. “Hey Falco, is this your family?”

Falco walked over to her and answered. “Yeah, that’s my family.” He started pointing to the people in the picture explaining who they were. “That’s my mom and dad, and that is my older brother Colt.”

“Oh, and that cute looking guy must be you.” Gabi chuckled pointing to a little twelve year old Falco sitting beside his brother on the rock they were sitting on.

“Uh, yeah, that’s me,” Falco blushed at her calling him cute. “I was like, twelve years old, and Colt was seventeen when this picture was taken. We were camping up in the Rockies as you can clearly see.” Falco pointed to the mountains in the background.

“Did your family do that a lot?”

“Oh yeah,” Falco took the picture from her hands to take a better look at it. “Every year when my dad got his vacation, we would pack up and go camping.”

Falco couldn’t help but smile thinking about those carefree days when he and Colt would find a new adventure behind every mountain bush. His families yearly summer camping trip had always been the highlight of the year for Falco who personally loved the outdoors and, in particular, the wildlife. There had been days when Falco wished the trips would never end, but the grind of life always called them back to home.

Gabi smiled warmly at the picture they were looking at. “Are you and your brother close?” she asked.

“We are.” Falco loved his brother very much, and knew that Colt loved him back almost as much. “He’s been there for me all my life. I couldn’t ask for a better big brother.”

Gabi continued to look at the picture with a saddened expression on her face. Falco could clearly see that something was bothering her. “Are you all right?” He asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Gabi wiped a tear from her eye indicating that she was not fine. “It’s just… it must be nice, having a big brother you can rely on.”

Falco gently put his picture back on the shelf Gabi had found it on, and turned around to face her. “Gabi,” he gently called to her. “Do you want to talk about something?”

“No, no, I’m fine. Just something in my eyes is all.” Gabi gave him a obviously forced smile and turned away from him. Falco considered pressing the matter, but decided to respect her privacy instead. Whatever emotion inside her that the picture caused to come out, she clearly didn’t want to discuss it.

There was an awkward silence in the room for several moments as Gabi sat quietly on the couch brooding about whatever was bothering her, and Falco sat on the other side of the couch waiting for dinner to arrive.

“Hey Falco,” Gabi was the first to break the silence between them.

“Yeah,”

“Did Colt ever hurt you?” Her voice was barely a whisper, but Falco could feel the weight behind her words.

“What… no… I mean, we had fights when we were little, but Colt would never hurt me.” The very thought was completely alien to Falco, and he couldn’t imagine why Gabi would even ask him that.

Gabi nodded understandingly. “Good,” she said. “Big brothers shouldn’t hurt their younger siblings.”

Before Falco could say anything, there was a knock on his door. The pizza had arrived. After they had paid the guy, Gabi and Falco say down on the couch to eat their meal.

“You’re a simple guy I see.” Gabi commented on his simple choice of pepperoni as compared to her more extravagant choice.

Falco grimaced at the strange looking combination of toppings that she was shoving in her mouth. “Well there’s beauty in simplicity if you ask me. Besides, at least I’m not going to have bad breath tomorrow.”

Gabi jumped forward and exhaled right in his face, giving him a good whiff of onions and anchovies. Falco gagged and fell back and almost dropped his pizza in the process. “Sorry, I just had to.” She giggled.

“Really,” He groaned somewhat annoyed at her little trick, but he couldn’t be mad at her because she looked just to cute when she smiled like that.

As they ate, Falco decided to turn on the TV to watch something. “Is there anything you want to watch?” He asked his guest.

Gabi shrugged noncommittally. “I don’t really watch much TV, so just watch whatever you usually watch and I’ll be fine with it.”

So Falco turned to the Discovery channel to watch the nature programs that he liked.

“Alright,” He said. “This show is a really good one. It’s a reality show about the San Diego Zoo.”

“Sounds good to me,” Gabi took another bite of pizza. “As long as there’s nothing gruesome about it, because watching baby animals getting killed isn’t really my cup of tea.”

“Relax,” Falco assured her. “They take care of animals, not kill them.”

A few episodes in and Gabi was hooked. They sat there together on the couch after they finished their pizza giggling at baby animals doing cute things. Falco was glad that Gabi liked the show, because not many people shared his secret delight, and it was fun to have someone to watch it with.

“Awww,” Gabi cooed. “Baby monkeys are so cute. Hell, all baby animals are cute.”

“I think all animals are great.” Falco replied to his friend who seemed to be enjoying the show as much as he was. “But yes, they do look cuter when they’re babies.”

“Do you want to watch more?” Gabi asked.

“Sure,” Falco sat up, grabbed the remote to adjust the volume, and scooted closer to Gabi. “We have all night.”

And they did have all night. For the next three hours, they watched episode after episode of the Zoo with Gabi showing no desire to go home tonight. As it got later, they both felt sleep closing in on them. Gabi stretched out her arms, yawned, and laid her head down on Falco’s shoulder. Falco was a bit surprised by her sudden movement, but welcomed it all the same.

As she lay there on Falco’s shoulder, drifting off to sleep, she quietly said. “You know today was really fun.” Her voice was filled with sleepiness. “It’s always nice to hang out with you. You can make my crumbiest days into good ones you know that.”

Falco understood what she was saying. After all, he felt the same way when he was with her. “Thanks Gabi, its fun being with you to…” But as he looked down on her, Falco discovered that Gabi had fallen asleep.

Smiling, Falco gently removed her head from his shoulder and gently laid her down on one of the couch pillows. Then he walked over to pull a quilt Udo’s mother had sent them for the closet, and draped it over her. He smiled as he looked at Gabi. She looked so cute and peaceful as she slept there on his couch. As he looked at herm Falco realized that while he had only known Gabi for a few months he knew that he had met someone special.

Now Falco felt the fatigue setting in on him, and realized that it was time for him to go to bed. Falco made sure to lock the door since he knew that Udo would be spending the night with Zophia, and then turned out all the lights before heading to his room. Once inside, where Gabi couldn’t accidentally see him if she happened to wake up, he changed into his pajamas and got ready to go to bed. It had been a long, tiring few days, so no sooner did his head hit his pillow did he feel the sweet feeling of sleep claim him


	10. In Which Zophia Wakes Up After Her Date

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, a fast update for once, incredible. Thought I'd give you all a Zophia point of view chapter this time. Come to think of it, there's never been any stories focused on these two which sucks because I like these kids. I was worried that this was too fluffy, but then I remembered, this is fanfiction.By the way, not sure how long it'll be before I upload the next chapter since it's going to be a long one. Enjoy.

Zophia had never been a morning person, which sucked since she waited tables at a local IHOP, and they opened early in the morning. Since they were naturally busy in the mornings, they always needed her to come in at around six in the morning so she had to get up early most days. She liked the job though. The people were good to work with, and the management worked around her hours. But it still sucked to have to get up early for work all the time. 

Fortunately for her, Zophia was off today, and her classes didn’t begin until ten this morning; so she could lie here in bed next to a snoring Udo as she quietly enjoyed the feeling of her sheets wrapped around her naked body. Looking over at the window, she could see tiny glimmers of orange light leaking through the curtains, and she realized that she would have to get up soon. That thought saddened though, since she really didn’t want to leave the comfort of her warm bed to go out into the freezing cold outside. Sighing, she turned over to look at Udo who was just as naked as she was, though she could only see his bare backside over the covers. 

She smiled when she remembered last night. Udo had picked her up outside her apartment as planned, and had taken her out to the expensive restaurant in Tybur tower called, the War hammer. Dinner had been great, and Udo had acted like a complete gentleman the whole time as she had come to expect of him. After they had finished their meals, Udo had taken her up to the very top of the building for a beautiful round of dancing. She smiled as she remembered how gracefully they had moved beneath the moonlight. Their cheeks had been turned red from the cold, but neither of them cared. They had just danced and danced together as the wind chilled them to the bone. 

Naturally, a night as romantic as that could only be capped off by going back to her apartment and making sweet love her amazing boyfriend that she never in a million years thought that she would have. Due to her introverted nature, Zophia had never been comfortable with the idea of having sex with anybody when she was in high school. The only time that she had come close to losing her virginity before she met Udo had been on the horrible prom night her mother had made her go to. The guy she had gone with, Floch his name was, had reeked of date rape, making her so nervous that she hadn’t been able to enjoy herself the whole time. While he hadn’t gone that far, fortunately for her, he had been pressuring her extremely hard to the point where she had almost given in to his demands, but she chickened out at the last second making him so pissed off that he just abandoned her on the side of the road forcing her to call Gabi to come pick her up.

After that, she had sworn that she would never let another man get that close to her ever again; a promise she kept until she met Udo. They had met each other in class, and sat together through most of their lectures. After a while, they started talking about little things at first like how boring their classes were, and how bland the cafeteria food was. But as they got to know each other, they started to realize that they were both similar in many ways. They were both quiet and introverted, they both enjoyed reading as opposed to other pastimes, and they both had similar goals in life with her studying to become a nurse, and Udo studying to become a doctor. 

After a few months growing closer to each other, Udo had finally worked up the courage to ask her out on a date. Zophia had been extremely reluctant at first, but eventually decided to give him a chance. Their first date had been wonderful with Udo treating her like she was a princess by holding the door open for her, by giving her flowers, and by not insisting that the night end with them having sex like she had feared he would. 

It would be several months into their relationship before Zophia had trusted Udo enough to go all the way with him. She had been a little scared at first, but Udo had done everything in his power to make her feel comfortable when they had their first time together. Sex had been like nothing she had ever experienced before, taking her to new levels of pleasure she had never thought possible. Since then it felt like they couldn’t have enough of each other since they had sex almost every time they saw each other. They couldn’t help it though, she loved him, and he loved her, and neither of them planned on stopping any time soon. 

As Zophia lay there reminiscing, She felt Udo shifting next to her indicating that he was almost awake. Slowly, he rolled over to face her confirming her suspicions that he was awake and smiled at her. 

“Morning,” He sleepily greeted. 

“Morning,” She greeted back.

Neither of them was ready to get up, so Udo wrapped her in his arms and they lay there peacefully and cuddled for what felt like an eternity. Zophia felt completely at peace, for outside the world was cold and stressful, but in here Udo’s body was warm and nothing could bother her when she was in his arms. 

“You know, we really should get up. We have school today.” Udo quietly mumbled as he gently massaged her bare back. 

“Mmm, probably,” Zophia sighed knowing that he was right, but she really didn’t want to go to school today. “Or we could just skip class and stay here like this forever.” She proposed.

Udo laughed at the suggestion. “Sounds nice, but unfortunately we can’t now, can we.”

Zophia sighed since she knew that she really should get up, so she slowly slipped out of the covers and slipped on Udo’s shirt, which had been carelessly discarded on the floor at the start of last nights sexual activities. 

“Hey, that’s my shirt,” Udo playfully reminded her. 

“I know,” Zophia teased. She knew that Udo found it sexy when she wore his shirts the morning after sex. 

“So what am I supposed to wear then?” Udo asked as if it was even a question. 

“Well,” Zophia walked over to the bed and leaned over Udo’s face just enough so that he could look down her shirt because she knew that would turn him on. “I guess you’ll just have to eat breakfast in nothing but your pants.” And with that, she planted a quick kiss on his lips and walked out of her bedroom. 

Zophia decide to make breakfast for the both of them. After all, Udo had spoiled her last night, and it was only fair that she return the favor by making him runny eggs. As she cooked their breakfast, Udo finally came out of her bedroom to join her. She smiled at him as he walked over to her wearing only the dress pants that he had worn to dinner last night. Udo wasn’t the most muscular man that ever lived, in fact, he was quite scrawny. But that didn’t mean that he looked any less attractive without his shirt on. 

Zophia giggled a little when Udo wrapped his arms around her waist and started kissing her neck. His kisses were small but passionate, and made her feel warm inside. She turned around, wrapped her arms around his neck, and started kissing him back almost as passionately. 

Zophia let out a squeal as Udo picked her up and set her down on the kitchen counter. She liked it when he did stuff like this though. She liked how he could be so assertive without being borderline abusive like her mother’s boyfriends were to her mother. They made out for what felt like an eternity, their arms wrapped around each other, their lips locked together, feeling like they were in heaven. Udo’s arms were busy as well. He ran one hand up and down her legs, and the other one groped her naked ass making them both feel aroused. 

Zophia wanted to take him right here on this counter top, but knew that she shouldn’t since she didn’t want the eggs to burn, and she knew that Gabi would through a fit if she found out that she and Udo had sex on the counter again. Hell, Gabi was still pissed off from the last time it had happened, even after she sprayed a whole bottle of disinfectant on the counter. 

“Hey,” She managed between kisses. “We really should stop. You do want to eat breakfast right?” 

Udo seemed to have different ideas though, since he only clenched her rear harder and groaned. “What I want is you, right here on this counter.” 

It took every ounce of willpower in her body to not give in to the hormones racing through her body. “Well, if you had come out before I started breakfast, maybe. But I already started the eggs,” Pointing over to the frying pan on the stove. “And in the time it will take us to finish, they’ll have burned.” 

Udo sighed in disappointment, and gently let her down off the counter. Giving him one last kiss on the cheek, Zophia went to finish making their breakfast.   
When she was finished, they sat down to eat together. They both looked a bit strange with Zophia only wearing Udo’s shirt leaving her bottom bare, and Udo only wearing his pants leaving his chest exposed. As they ate, Zophia realized that they would have to get dressed soon since it was kind of cold in here, and Udo’s shirt only covered so much. But any excuse to look at Udo without his shirt on was more than enough reason to stay here like this. 

While she ate, Zophia checked her phone to see if she had missed anything important. Most of the messages she missed were just junk, except for one text from Gabi that made her smile. 

“Hey, check this out,” Zophia held up her phone to Udo. “Gabi went over to your place yesterday to hang out with Falco.” 

“Well all right,” Udo did a small fist pump in the air as he put another bite of eggs into his mouth. “Good to know that our little scheme to get them together is working out.” But then Udo looked over at the bedroom he had spent all night in with a puzzled expression on his face and said. “Wait, does that mean she spent the night with him? Because we were here all night, and she never came back, so does that mean that they…” 

Zophia realized what he was implying and put his mind at ease. “No, no, I’m pretty sure that Gabi wouldn’t go that far after only knowing Falco for a few months. She probably knew that we were coming back here last night, and asked Falco if she could sleep over so she didn’t have to hear us messing around.” 

“Hmm,” Udo nodded in agreement. “You’re probably right. I’m sure Falco would have absolutely no problem with her staying over, since he’s a really nice guy. And I’m know for a fact that he wouldn’t hit on her at all, which is probably why she felt comfortable staying with him in the first place.” 

Zophia could agree with Udo’s assessment of the growing relationship between Gabi and Falco. To everyone else, Gabi came off as an average, energetic, spunky college student, but Zophia, who had known her since she was six years old, knew a different side of her. Sometimes she would lie awake at night and listen to the sound of Gabi violently tossing and turning in the bed next to her while she was being tormented by whatever nightmares were assailing her that night. Some mornings, Zophia would be suddenly awakened by the sound of Gabi screaming out the names of people lost to her as she forced herself awake from the nightmares that frequently visited her. Worst of all, Zophia was one of the few people in the world who knew about the horrible self inflicted scars on Gabi’s left hand shoulder. 

Zophia had first met Gabi back in first grade. All the other girls in school had thought that since Zophia was quiet and shy, that she was a weirdo or something. But out of all of the girls in school, Gabi alone had been the one to try to make friends with her. Back then Gabi had been positive and upbeat about everything, and was truly fun to hang around with. Yes, Gabi could be a little bratty and overbearing, but she had also been a loyal and true friend who loved everyone in her life and wanted what was best for her friends. Those had been good years for both of them back when their lives were stable and every day had been a new adventure. 

But those days came to a close when Zophia was ten years old when her mom packed up and moved to a small town called Dauper, because the new guy her mom was sleeping with had a new job there. However, once they moved, he and her mom broke up leaving them both stranded with no one to help them. Things had been hard for Zophia and her mom since her mom was broke, and none of the kids at Zophia’s new school liked her at all. 

But one day when Zophia was twleve years old, she came to school and saw a familiar face wandering the halls. She discovered, to her delight, that it was her old friend Gabi who had just moved in with a new family that lived on the outskirts of town. The two had been frilled to see each other after several years of being apart and quickly rekindled their tight friendship.

However, Zophia soon realized that this new Gabi wasn’t exactly the one she had known in elementary school. The confident and spunky Gabi who always talked like she could do anything was replaced with a skittish and depressed Gabi who would freak out at the slightest movement and start mumbling something about devils trying to hurt her. It was only around the time that they graduated high school that Zophia saw Gabi return to something like her old, confident self, but even now, Zophia could still see the sadness and anxiety consuming Gabi from the inside, no matter how much she tried to hide it. 

It truly saddened Zophia to see her friend suffer like this. She understood what Gabi was going through; after all, she had had her fair share of mental issues back in high school no thanks to her mother and her merry go round of dipshit boyfriends. She even had a few scars on her left arm to prove it. But she knew that whatever issues she had back then were nothing compared to what Gabi endured. She wanted to help Gabi, but all she could offer was a shoulder to cry on when the nightmares were too much for Gabi to bare.

One day, however, Zophia had been having lunch with Udo, and the two started talking about their respective friends. Udo was concerned that Falco would die a virgin who never kissed a girl in his life, but didn’t want him to end up with some crazy bitch who would just use him and try to change who he was to suite her needs. Zophia wanted Gabi to have a perfect relationship like she had, but didn’t want Gabi to get involved with some dickhead like Zophia’s mom always seemed to. That, and Zophia knew that for all her talk of not caring if he had a boyfriend or not, Gabi was secretly scared of being alone her whole life. 

So as they talked, it had suddenly occurred to both of them that they both had the solution to the others problem. Udo had Falco, and Zophia had Gabi, they could be a couple. Udo was knew that Gabi was simple down to earth person with a big, caring heart, which Falco would like, who would love him for who he was and not what she wanted him to be, and Zophia knew that Falco was a kind, caring gentleman with a heart of gold, who always put others before himself, which she knew Gabi would like since for all her tomboyish nature, she secretly wanted a white knight to come and sweep her off her feet. 

Plans to get them together had been made after that, starting with the study date in which Gabi and Falco first met, and soon followed with sticking them with each other at the movies and at the Halloween party. Zophia knew Gabi well enough to know that she really liked Falco from the way she talked about him. And Udo had said that Falco was also starting to enjoy Gabi’s company, which proved that this experiment was working out after all. It pleased Zophia to know that her friend had a chance at being happy for once, and after all the hard times that Gabi had helped her through, it would be nice for Zophia to return the favor. 

“They do make a cute couple, don’t they?” Zophia asked her boyfriend. 

“Totally,” Udo finished off the eggs she had made him and wiped his face off with a napkin. “If you girls had gone to our high school prom, Gabi and Falco would have been the homecoming king and queen, with you and me as runner ups.” 

“You don’t think we would have won over them?” Zophia playfully pouted.

“Hey, we’re a good couple and all, but no one’s going to pick a nerd like me over two dorks in love like Gabi and Falco. I mean, come on, they would be the perfect couple if they got together. They just don’t know it yet.” 

“I know,” Zophia chuckled. “I was just teasing. Gabi and Falco are going to be a cuter couple than we ever will be.” And Zophia meant it to. 

“Agreed,” Udo took their plates and put them in the sink. “Hey, can I use your shower before we head out?” 

“Be my guest,” Then Zophia smiled playfully, got up off her seat, and started unbuttoning her shirt. “But, only if we use it together.” 

The shocked expression on Udo’s face was all the answer she needed.


	11. In Which Gabi and Falco Have Breakfast Together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, here's the production history behind this chapter. I spent several weeks writing thousands of words worth of material for this chapter, but I ran into trouble getting some scenes to transition into another. This led to a case of writers block where I spent a few weeks not writing anything. Eventually, I gave up and decided to rewrite the whole chapter. As I wrote, I realized that this chapter was too big to be one chapter, so I decided to split it in two instead, which I thought worked out better in the end. I really like this chapter, and hope that you do to. And once again, thank you all for the positive comments that you've been sending. They really make my day.

_"Reiner," The little girl called out. She was scared and alone, not to mention lost in this strange place that she didn't recognize. The sun didn't shine here, and a dense, grey fog that smelled of rot and decay fouled the air. The darkness was so dense that she could feel it weighing on her with every step she took. And worse of all, there were things moving about in the darkness. Horrible, nameless things that she couldn't see for every time she tried to look, they disappeared before her eyes could spot them. Subconsciously she knew what they were though, The Devils._

They were after her again, as they always were. Trying to take her away, and drag her against her will to some horrible place where only unspeakable horrors lie. They did this to her every night when her mind took her to this place,a place of sadness and woe where misery prevailed over joy.

She was truly scared now as she rightfully deserved to be, but she knew if she found Reiner everything would be all right. Reiner was her big strong brother figure, he wouldn't be scared of The Devils. He would chase them away and protect her like he always did, because that's what he's supposed to do, right. With that reassuring thought in mind, the little girl hugged the stuffed bunny she was holding closer to her chest and kept moving forward.

She walked for what felt like an eternity, with her eyes darting back and forth for fear of what might be lying in wait for her in this terrible, dark place. With every step she took, her fear increased for she could her The Devils getting closer to her. She knew that if she didn't find Reiner soon, The Devils would surely catch her and drag her away to some horrible place where unspeakable torment awaited her. 

Eventually, she came across a familiar sight. A wave of relief flooded her when she realized that she had found Reiner's old house. She smiled when she saw the house that he had bought with Historia after they got married. It looked different though, and not in a good way either. The old house was run down with loose shutters hanging from the windows, paint peeling off the walls, and shingles falling off the roof. It didn't matter to the little girl though, just as long as Reiner was inside, because she really needed him right now.

She quickly hurried inside before any of the creature found her, and discovered that the interior of the house was just as ugly as the outside. Mold grew on the walls, bits of shattered glass covered the floor, and brown water dripped down from the ceiling above creating a puddle in the kitchen. She didn't think about that though, she desperately needed to find Reiner before The Devils found them.

She found her beloved cousin sitting alone on the couch in the living room. He sat there as he always did when she found him. With his blond beard untrimmed, his back slouched as he brooded over things that had gone wrong in his life, and a expression on his face that reeked of sadness and depression built up over a lifetime of failure and disappointment. 

She quickly rushed over to him in excitement. "Reiner!" She exclaimed as she tried to hug him. "Reiner," She softly asked him. "Where are we? What is this place?"

He didn't answer her like he always did when she found him; he just sat there lost in his own misery like always. The Devils were getting closer now; she could see them moving around the windows trying to find their way in. "Reiner please, we need to go now. The Devils are coming." She pleaded with him as she tugged on his arm trying to get him to come with her.

Reiner simply looked at her with that horrible sad expression on his face and said. "You know, you are the only person in my life whose ever truly loved me. I'm so sorry." And with that, he took out his gun, and despite her feeble protests, stuck the gun in his mouth and...

“Reiner!” Gabi screamed as she jolted awake from her nightmare. She frantically looked around searching for her long dead cousin only to realize that it had all been a dream. She breathed a sigh of relief and took in her surroundings while she tried to catch her breath. She could see that she was on Falco’s couch in his apartment. She must’ve fallen asleep last night while they were watching all those animal show he liked.

Gabi looked down at her waist and saw that there was a quilt covering the lower half of her body. She smiled when she realized that Falco must’ve put it on her while she was sleeping. Such a considerate thing for him to do since it had been cold last night and she might have been freezing while she slept. God, Falco was such a nice person. It was so sweet of him to think about her like this.

Gabi stretched out and yawned. She realized that she was still wearing the hoodie and jeans that she wore yesterday, so as a result her body felt somewhat achy and also a bit itchy. She decided to get up since it was late enough and due to her nightmare, she had no desire to go back to sleep. She stretched once more, got up off the couch, and started neatly folding up the quilt Falco had covered her in last night since she didn’t want seem like some rude bitch that would just trash his place and leave without a second thought.

Once she was done, she looked around the room for some trace of Falco but didn’t see him. She figured that he must still be in bed or something, and decided not to disturb him. She pondered about what she was going to have for breakfast, and debated about whether or not she should help herself to some of Falco’s food. She decided against it of course. After all, she had stayed the night on his couch without asking, and she didn’t want to impose on him any more than she already had, so she decided to just leave as quietly as possible. She did really have to pee though, so she walked over to the bathroom to quickly relieve herself before she left. 

However, when Gabi opened the door to the bathroom, she found Falco standing there in his underwear while he was about to put on his pants. “Shit, Gabi!” Falco exclaimed as he desperately tried to cover himself.

“Oh shit, sorry!” Gabi cried out as she quickly slammed the bathroom door shut. She fell back against the opposite wall as she tried to put as much distance between herself and the bathroom as possible. Okay, that had been embarrassing. Now she could only hope that Falco wasn’t too pissed off at her.

After nervously waiting a few minutes, Gabi slowly approached the bathroom door to see if it was alright to come in. Inside she could hear sounds of Falco desperately fumbling around with his jeans. Bringing her right hand up to the door, she gently knocked, took a deep breath and said. “Hey Falco,”

“Yes,” He called back. She could hear the embarrassment in his voice.

“I’m sorry about that, okay. I didn’t know that you were in there.” She said with an awkward tone in her voice.

“It’s okay; I was just using the shower.” He reassured her. “Do you really need to use the bathroom or something?”

“Yeah, I was just going to use it real quick before I headed out.”

The door opened forcing Gabi to take a few steps back, and Falco emerged wearing only his pants leaving his chest exposed. Gabi felt her mouth go dry at the sight of him. Wow, he was ripped. Granted, his abs weren’t the largest she’d ever seen, they were more medium sized, but he clearly worked out a lot. What made him seem even more attractive was the fact there was still steam coming out of the bathroom causing water that came from the precipitation to run down his chest over his strong muscles.

“You’re leaving.” Falco said with a hint of disappointment in his voice.

Gabi took her eyes off his slightly muscular chest and managed to make eye contact with him. “Yeah,” She stuttered still being a bit embarrassed from walking in on him while he had been changing, and from checking him out right now. “I have to go to class in a couple hours, and I wanted to head home so I could shower and eat breakfast before I left.”

“Oh,” Falco scratched the back of his head. Thing is, I was actually planning on making breakfast for the both of us when you got up.”

“Oh, really,” Gabi hadn’t expected that.

“Yeah, there’s a box of pancake mix that I’ve had for a while but never used since I’ve never had the time, but I figured that since you’re here this would be a good time to use it.”

“Oh Falco, you don’t have to do that.” Gabi protested. “I’ve already imposed on you enough as it is.”

“No, no, it’s fine.” Falco awkwardly stammered. “I’ve had a hankering for pancakes for a while now, and you’ve given me a perfect excuse to make them; unless you really need to go or something.”

“What, no,” Gabi darted her eyes back and forth not being sure how to deal with Falco’s generosity. “I don’t really need to head out just now. I just don’t want to be a bother or anything.” 

“You’re not. I promise you.” Falco reassured her. “I honestly wouldn’t mind making you breakfast, how about it?”

Gabi was about to protest some more since she never liked feeling like she was burden on someone, but then she looked into Falco’s deep blue eyes in that God awfully cute, sandy blond haired face of his and realized that she really had no practical reason to leave right now. “All right,” She smiled at him. “Breakfast would be nice.”

“Great, I’ll get started then.”

“After you put on a shirt right,” Gabi pointed to his stomach.

Falco looked down at himself and realized that he was shirtless. “Oh shit, I’m sorry.” He blushed with embarrassment. “I’ll go do that real quickly.”

“Yeah, that would be nice,” Gabi said while trying to keep a straight face as she watched Falco walk past her to go to his room to put on a shirt. 

After Falco closed the door to his room, Gabi sniffed her armpits and found that she stank. It wasn’t surprising since she hadn’t showered since yesterday morning, and she always seemed to work up a sweat at work. She pulled her nose away from her armpits in disgust. She seemed to be cursed with bad body odor, something that had plagued her since she hit puberty. She knew that she couldn’t go to class smelling like this, but if she was having breakfast with Falco then she wouldn’t have time to go home to clean herself. She sighed when she realized that there was only one solution then, and it required imposing on Falco once more.

When Falco emerged from his room wearing a Nike sweat shirt, Gabi asked him using the sweetest voice that she could possibly muster. “Hey Falco, I was wondering. Could I maybe use your shower real quick while you’re making breakfast?” She even added a sweet smile showing him all her perfectly white teeth to make it seem less awkward to him. Even with her limited knowledge of the social norms, she still knew that it wasn’t entirely polite to use someone’s shower when you come over to their home. 

“Oh sure, be my guest,” Falco gestured towards him bathroom. To her relief, he didn’t seem too fazed by her request, and even seemed more than willing to grant it. That made her feel a little less awkward, since she didn’t like imposing on people, but she really needed a shower.

“Thank you so much,” She said letting the gratitude spill out of her voice. “I really need one.” And with that, she hurried into the bathroom eager to wash off the stench that was coming from her armpits.

Once in the shower, the hot water felt wonderful running off her bare skin. Gabi couldn’t help but smile in relief as she ran Falco’s generic, store brand shampoo through her hair. Ever since Reiner died, she had hated feeling unclean. She knew that it probably had something to do with the fact that after Reiner had died, Sasha had been forced to help her clean his red, sticky blood off her face. Therefore, the cleaner she was, the better she felt.

After rinsing the shampoo out of her hair, Gabi grabbed the bar of soap she found only to discover that it still had quite a few hairs on it. She spat out her tongue in disgust when she realized that the black curly ones were probably Udo’s crotch hairs. She considered trying to find a new one, but decided against it since she didn’t want to be rude to Falco in any way. After all, he had been so nice to her these last few months, and she wasn’t going to repay him being a complete bitch to him by saying, “Hey Falco, could I get a new bar of soap, this one has your friend’s crotch hairs on it.” So she simply just tried to use the side that had fewer hairs on it than the other, and that worked out just fine.

When she was done with her shower, Gabi turned that water off and helped herself to a spare towel that she found underneath the sink. As she dried off her hair, she turned to look in the mirror, but found it fogged over so that she couldn’t see her reflection. Wrapping herself in the towel, she nervously brought her hand up to the mirror and wiped away the precipitation, though deep down, a part of her was worried about what she would see.

To her relief, she saw only her nice, clean face with not a drop of blood on it. She smiled and shook her head. What had she been thinking, what had happened with Reiner had been years ago, it had been so silly of her to think that there might still be residual remains of his blood in her hair. 

After she was done drying off, she took the hair brush that she kept in her backpack and started to attempt to brush her hair. She winced in pain every time she hit a knot as she struggled to successfully run the brush down her hair. Why did her hair have to be such a pain in the ass to manage? She truly envied Zophia who had such wonderful, silken hair to deal with. Zophia could just spend five minutes brushing her hair and then arrange any way she wanted it, as compared to herself who sometimes needed fifteen minutes to brush and even then her hair would only be manageable if she wrapped it into the messy ponytail that she always wore.

Gabi wondered if she should maybe talk to Sasha for advice on managing her messy hair when she saw her again. After all, she knew that Sasha had complained of having hair problems when she was in high school. When Gabi was little, she hadn’t thought much of Sasha’s hair. But now that she was older and wiser about such things girl related, she understood that Sasha’s hair style hadn’t been the best. Sasha had always tied her hair up in a messy pony tail with various strands of hair sticking out due to the difficulty of her hair. It was acceptable when Sasha was younger, but Gabi knew that when Sasha got older she realized that she needed a more professional and mature look for herself.

So Sasha cut her hair shorter to make it more workable, and grew out the right side of her bangs to make her look more mature. Gabi had to say that she loved Sasha’a new look better than she had her old one since it really did make her look much prettier and more adult. So if anyone could help her fix her mess of a hair style, it was definitely Sasha.

After Gabi finished getting dressed, she exited the bathroom only to be greeted by the sound of pancakes sizzling, the horrible smell of something burning, and so much smoke coming out of the kitchen that she was surprised that the smoke detectors weren’t going off. She hurried to the kitchen to see what the hell was going on, and saw Falco struggling to flip a pair of burning pancakes that were practically glued to the frying pan he was using. He was clearly very frustrated judging from the way he was swearing under his breath. 

“Um, Falco,” Gabi quietly called out.

Falco turned around with a start and tried to use his body to block her view of his smoking stove. “Gabi,” He said. “I was um, I was just…” He continued to stammer. He smiled as he tried to hide the disaster behind him. “Um, breakfast is almost ready,” He gestured to the burnt pancakes behind him. “I, uh, I just need a few more minutes to…”

“Yeah, let me stop you there.” Gabi cut him off. She pointed to the burning mess behind him and said. “Those are burnt aren’t they?”

Falco’s shoulders dropped with shame at her statement. He took a deep breath and answered. “Yeah, they are.” There was a tone of embarrassment in his voice so Gabi didn’t want to make him feel too bad about this.

“May I ask what happened?” She sheepishly asked.

Falco looked at what was supposed to be breakfast and said. “I’m not sure, I tried to flip them and they just wouldn’t budge. One thing led to another and pretty soon, well, you know.” He pointed to all the smoke in the room to make his point.

“Okay, what did you spray the pan with?”

Falco looked over at the burnt remains in the frying pan and said. “Oh shit, was that what I supposed to do?”

“Um, yeah, that’s what you need to do first.” Gabi nodded and crossed her arms across her chest while trying to keep her voice as neutral as possible.

“Well shit,” Falco mumbled clearly internally kicking himself for his mistake.

“You don’t know how to cook pancakes do you?” Gabi asked though the answer seemed obvious to her. 

Falco shook his head in shame, clearly embarrassed by this whole thing. “I’m sorry,” He said. “I probably shouldn’t have tried anything like this, Hell; it’s why the pancake mix went unused for so long. I just really wanted to make you something really nice for breakfast that’s all.”

Gabi nodded in acknowledgment while trying to keep a smile from her face. Falco was clearly squirming around like he was expecting her to yell at him for ruining the breakfast that he’d promised her. He must’ve thought that she was mad at him or something judging from the sheepish expression on his face, which couldn’t be farther from the truth. She understood how he was feeling right now. After all, she had been in a similar position back when she first moved in with the Brauses and had wanted to repay them for their kindness to her. 

Gabi examined him for a moment, and discovered, to her amusement, that he had tiny smudges of flour all across his face. She felt a simile force it way onto her face as she found herself starting to giggle at the sight of him. She couldn’t help it. He just looked so cute like that covered in flour from his failed attempt to make her breakfast.

“Um, Gabi,” Falco seemed confused at sudden laughter at his expense. He was even more surprised when Gabi walked up to him, licked her thumb, and started wiping the flour off his face. “What are you…?”

“Just hold on a second,” Gabi chuckled as she wiped smudges of flour off his face.

Gabi did that for a few minutes, giggling to herself in amusement at the sight of him while Falco cringed at the feeling of her wet thumb on his face but tolerated it all the same. This wasn’t particularly the way Gabi had seen this morning going, but she had to admit, it was a very interesting turn of events and sometimes a little interesting could be welcome in her monotonous life.

“So, um,” Falco said when he eventually found his voice. “Do you like cereal?”

“I love cereal.” She said as she finished wiping off his face. 

“Great, what kind do like.” Falco said as he took a wash cloth from the sink to do a more thorough wipe down of his face.

Gabi shrugged and asked. “What do you have?”

“Well let’s see,” Falco led her over to his small pantry and opened the doors to look inside. Gabi looked in and could see that his shelves didn’t have a lot on them. He must be on a tight food budget like she was.

“We have ‘Frosted Flakes’, two kinds of ‘Cheerios’, ‘Mini Wheat’s,’ some kind of weird organic cereal that Udo likes…”

“I’ll have the ‘Honey Nut Cheerios’.” Gabi said.

“Oh, good choice,” Falco complimented her. He took the box off the shelf and handed it to her. Thanking him politely, Gabi grabbed a bowel and a spoon from the kitchen, and walked over to his dining room table to eat her breakfast.

As she poured the contents of her cereal box into her bowel, she noticed that Falco was still making his breakfast. “Hey, do you want some toast?” He asked her.

“Nope, I’m good thank you.” She answered with her mouth still full of ‘Cheerios’.

She continued to eat her breakfast while she waited for Falco to join her. She could honestly say that this morning was going pretty well for her. Yes, last night had sucked with her nightmare and all, but things were looking up now. She had woken up covered in a quilt that her new friend had left her, she had gotten a source of entertainment from Falco’s failed attempt to make breakfast, and now her she was eating a healthy meal with one of the most decent people she had ever known.

She smiled as she watched Falco wait for his toast to come out of the toaster. He was such a nice guy. One of the nicest she had ever known. He was always so sweet and considerate, not to mention cute as well. God, if only more people would be like him. If he had gone to her high school, and if she hadn’t been such a nervous wreck back then, she would’ve definitely considered asking him out.

After all, it wasn’t that she wasn’t interested in boys; it was just that all the ones that she knew were complete dickheads. But not Falco though, She had a feeling that Falco was just one of those genuinely nice persons who cared more about others more than himself, which was a huge turn on in her book. She pushed such silly thought out of her mind though. After all, she knew that it was a huge possibility that Falco was gay, since she knew that no straight guy could ever be this nice to her without the hidden agenda of sex behind it.

Eventually, Falco sat down to join her with his toast sitting on a small plate in his hands. He also brought with him some butter and strawberry jam to spread on his toast. As he buttered his toast, he asked her. “Hey Gabi, do you maybe want to hang out later after school?” 

“Sure,” Hanging out with him again sounded like fun after last night. “What do you want to do?”

“Well I was thinking that we could go jogging around the park again like we did last time if that’s what you want.”

Gabi thought about it and realized what he was suggesting. It was supposed to be in the low forties this afternoon with a wind chill in the thirties. Only a nut would want to go jogging in that type of weather, and he wanted to. She smiled. Clearly great minds do think alike after all.

“That sounds great,” She said. What’s the fun in exercising without a little discomfort?

“Great,” He said clearly trying to hide the excitement in his voice. He must’ve really wanted to go with her or something. “I’ll see you around four then.” He said as he started to spread the strawberry jam across his toast.

“Sounds good,” She confirmed as she took another spoonful of cereal. She smiled as she watched him spread the red jam on the bread in his hands. This was clearly going to be a good day she thought to herself as she continued to watch him spread the red jam on his breakfast; the red jam, so very red, running across his toast like blood dripping down her face.

She continued to watch as Falco scooped out another lump of red jam with his knife. Gabi’s lips began to quiver as horrible memories that she had always tried to suppress started crawling their way into her mind. Memories of Reiner’s life blood pouring out of the gaping hole in his skull where previously a bullet had gone through. Memories of that same blood spaying all over her twelve year old self’s face; and worst of all, the horrible image of Reiner’s lifeless eyes rolled back in his skull staring at her. 

All of a sudden, Gabi felt nauseous. She could feel her breathing increase dramatically as her eyes darted around the room looking for something that she knew wasn’t there. What was she doing here, why was she here. Suddenly she couldn’t take her eyes off the jam. So red like blood, Reiner’s blood, smeared across her face and hair and all over her clothes as well. It was all she could do to keep herself from throwing up.

This couldn’t be happening, not here, not with Falco so close to her; not after she had gone so long without one of these attacks. Oh God, please don’t let him notice, not after this day had began so perfectly.

“Um Gabi,” Falco broke her out of her disturbing thoughts. “Are you okay?” She could hear the concern in his voice.

She looked down at her hands and saw that they were trembling so much that ‘Cheerios’ were falling off her spoon onto the table below her. Oh shit, he had seen after all. Now he was going to start asking questions, questions that he wouldn’t like that answers to. Once he learned about her problem, she knew that he wouldn’t want to be her friend any more. After all, who would want to be friends with some anxious freak who had a long history of mental problems dating back to when she was twelve? She needed to get out of here fast before he learned the truth. 

Without any warning, Gabi bolted out of her chair and sprinted over to the door where her backpack and shoes were. Hopefully she could get out of here before she made things worse with Falco.

“Whoa, wait, Gabi where are you going?” Falco called out as she desperately tried to put on her shoes. She didn’t answer. She needed to get out of here. Just when she had her shoes on and was about to run out, Falco grabbed her arm preventing her from leaving.

“Gabi wait, what’s wrong?”

“Let go of me, Falco.” Gabi struggled against him to no avail.

“Not until you tell me what’s wrong.” Falco insisted.

“Let me go.” Gabi continued to struggle, her frustration rising.

“Gabi please,” Falco said in calm, reassuring voice. “Just tell me what’s wrong and I’ll…”

“Goddammit Falco, let me go!” And with that, Gabi shoved him off her making him fall to the floor.

Gabi was about to make a run for it, but she turned back and saw Falco on the floor trying to collect himself after his fall. She instantly felt regret course over her since she hadn’t meant to shove him, but with his insisting, he had given her no choice. It still made her feel horrible though, he had treated her kindly and she had repaid him by shoving him on the floor.

She moved to go towards him, but stopped when she saw the pained expression on his face. “Gabi,” He quietly said.

Gabi opened her mouth to say that she was sorry, but the words got stuck in her throat. Instead she turned and ran out the door as fast as she could. As she ran down the hallways of Falco’s dorm complex, she could feel tears running down her cheeks like a great waterfall pouring down her face. She didn’t think about that though. All she could think about was the horrible feeling of Reiner’s blood all over her face, and the fact that she knew that the devils were after her again. 


	12. In Which We Meet Pieck

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well here it finally is. Sorry about the wait, I tried publishing this other story which wasn't that good so that distracted me from this. The other story didn't receive the response I had hoped it would(Eren x Mikasa Shippers are salty) but whatever. Funny fact, I had originally planned on making Pieck's last name Reines, but chapter 126 changed that for me. Well, till next time.

Gabi ran as fast as she could down the stairways of the boys’ dorm complex. She didn’t care where she was running to, she just ran as fast as her legs could take her. She had tried taking the elevator, but it didn’t arrive fast enough so she decided to make a break for the stairs before Falco came out to confront her as she knew he would have eventually. So here she was, running down the stairs two steps at a time trying to get away from whatever she thought was chasing her. 

As soon as Gabi reached the ground floor, she bolted out the front door and rushed into the campus grounds. It was a bit chilly out, but Gabi didn’t notice. People stared at her, but she paid it no mind. Sweat poured down her forehead as she tore through campus desperately looking for somewhere to hide. The Devils were back, she needed to get away from them. 

She eventually found a tree surrounded by a row of thick bushes located in the middle of campus, and decided to use that as a place to hide until this attack stopped. Upon reaching it she pushed through the bushes, poking herself on several branches in the process, and sat down on the ground while she tried to keep her head low to avoid the attention of her fellow students. 

Gabi desperately looked through the cracks in the bushes trying to see if anyone could see her. To her relief, it looked like no one did, that, or no one cared. Now that she was sure that no one was watching her, she hugged her knees up to her chin forming a little ball with her body, and tried to calm herself down. 

That was easier said than done though, because right now her body was in full panic mode. She could feel her heart pounding away in her chest making it impossible for her to lower her adrenaline levels. Her hands were trembling, and nothing she did could make them stop. She was sure that she was hyperventilating, which was bad because she could barely breathe right now. It felt like there was an invisible hand on her throat choking her, preventing her from getting much needed oxygen to her lungs. 

Shit, shit, shit, Gabi thought to herself as she felt tears roll down her cheeks. “There are no Devils; it’s all in your head.” She mumbled as the tears started to blur her vision. Why did this happen to her, why was she like this? She had been having a perfect morning with Falco and she just had to ruin it with her stupid personal crap. Oh God, she had even shoved him on the floor when he saw that she was having problem of some sort and tried to help her. 

She tucked her head under her arms and tried to suppress the sobs that were starting to come out of her mouth, but to no avail. The tears flowed out of her as she quietly cried into her arms. She was such a piece of shit. Falco had been nothing but kind to her, and she had repaid his kindness by knocking him down. What kind of friend did that to another friend? She knew now that Falco would never want to see her again, and quite frankly, she couldn’t blame him. After all, who would want to spend time with a freak like her who would have a meltdown just because strawberry jam reminded her of her cousin’s blood? 

Damn it, Falco had been such a good friend too, but there was no way that he would understand what was going on inside her mind. There was no way in hell that someone as perfect as Falco could possibly understand what it was like to stay awake all night worrying about things that could happen, or might not happen. He couldn’t know what it was like to be constantly stressing about how people perceive him. And most importantly, he didn’t know what it was like to be afraid of imaginary devils that weren’t real.

Gabi’s sobs started to come more freely despite her best efforts to contain them. Why did things have to be this way? Why did she have to be so screwed up? Why was she such a burden on everybody? Why couldn’t she just have a normal and happy life like everyone else? 

With that last thought in mind, Gabi broke down completely and started crying uncontrollably not caring if anyone heard her or not. Because she knew the answer to all of those questions. Her mental problems all stemmed from one horrible incident when she was twelve years old that had scarred her for life. That one terrible moment was the source of all the hideous nightmares that tormented her in her sleep and of the terrible pain and grief that she had carried around with her all these years. The worst thing about it was the fact that she knew that the horrible moment had been caused by someone that she had dearly loved, and it was because of his selfishness that she was so messed up like this.

God, why had Reiner done that to her, she thought to herself as her tears stained her sleeves. Didn’t he know how badly what he did would scar her? He could’ve killed himself anywhere in the world, but for whatever reason he chose to shoot himself in front of his twelve year old cousin who worshipped the ground he walked on.

Gabi clutched her head and shook it as unwanted memories started making their way into her mind. Memories of Reiner lying back on the couch with his terrible, lifeless eyes rolled back in head; memories of the blood that poured out of his skull, down onto her hands below; memories of Reiner’s brains splattered all over her face. She had done her best to suppress these terrible memories over the years, but they still haunted her whenever she closed her eyes at night. 

“Get out,” Gabi murmured as she tried to push those thoughts out of her mind. “Get the fuck out,” But no matter how hard she tried, the memories of that day still clung to her mind like flies to dead flesh. 

“Mind if I join you?” a sweet yet sleepy voice broke Gabi out of her depressing thoughts. She wiped the tears out of her eyes, and looked up to find that the voice belonged to none other than Ms Pieck Finger, one of the most beloved teachers in the university, looking down on her from over the edge of the bushes. 

“Hi Ms Pieck,” Gabi sniffed. “You can sit down if you want.” 

Ms Pieck looked amazing as she always did. With her naturally pretty face that won the hearts of countless male students, her beautiful black hair tied back into a neat pony tail, and that sweet smile that of hers that made even the worst ass holes in the world fall in love with her. She was wearing a red skirt that went down to her ankles, and a long, brown overcoat that covered the white blouse she was wearing underneath. In her right hand she held a cup of Starbucks coffee that Gabi could only assume came from the store that she worked at. 

Ms Pieck had been a friend of Reiner’s when he was a child. When Gabi was younger, Ms Pieck and Mr. Galliard would sometimes come over for dinner with Reiner and Historia, which usually ended with the two of them sitting there uncomfortably while Reiner and Historia yelled at each other. Gabi had always liked both of them, but after Reiner’s funeral Gabi didn’t see Ms Pieck until she went to college and discovered that she was teaching here. 

Of all the teachers at Marley University, Ms Pieck was definitely Gabi’s favorite. She was always kind and sweet to all her students, never raising her voice to any of them except when they were really unruly which was hardly ever because everyone loved her. The girls loved her because she was always willing to talk to them about their problems, and even gossip with them about things. The boys loved her because she was cute and pretty, therefore, Gabi theorized that Ms Pieck made her way into a lot of the boys’ masturbation fantasies. And finally, Gabi personally liked her because Ms Pieck was genuinely a kind, caring, funny person who cared about her student more than she cared about herself and was willing to help the slower students who struggled at their schoolwork instead of leaving them to drown like many teachers Gabi had know in her short life would have. 

Ms Pieck pushed through the bushes and sat down next to Gabi. Gabi felt a bit embarrassed about the fact that Ms Pieck was seeing her like this, but was relieved when she didn’t seem to notice the state Gabi was in, or at least she pretended not to. Taking a long sip of coffee, Ms Pieck looked up at the sky and said. “Lovely day isn’t it.” 

Gabi sniffled and said. “I guess, it’s a bit cold though.” 

“Well I think it is anyway.” Ms Pieck said as she stretched out her arms and yawned. “I’m so sorry,” She apologized. “Pock kept me up all night with his snoring.” Ms Pieck and Mr. Galliard’s relationship was one of the worst kept secrets in the school. “That’s why I need this to keep me going through the day.” Holding up her Starbucks cup to show Gabi what she was talking about. 

Gabi giggled at her funny remarks. Ms Pieck was always funny and could lighten any mood no matter how dark it was. And she knew that she could use a little mood lightening right now. 

Ms Pieck took another sip before continuing. “I went over to that Starbucks in the Albertson’s across the street. You work there don’t you?” 

Gabi nodded silently. 

“Well I was quite disappointed to not see you working there today. The older fat lady who was there didn’t seem to like her job very much since she was mumbling under her breath when she took my order. It took her forever to make my coffee since she spent five minutes arguing with that white haired manager of yours about whatever she was upset about.” 

That brought a smile to Gabi’s face. “Yeah,” She laughed. “Jane’s a real pain in the ass.” 

“So many people are aren’t they?” Ms Pieck shook her head. “Why can’t people just be nice? Is their personal crap so horrible that they have to make everyone’s lives miserable?” 

“Yeah,” Gabi sighed. “It sucks.” 

Ms Pieck leaned over and whispered in her ear. “Just so you know, it only gets worse when you reach the professional level.” 

Well that was great to know. It was bad enough that Gabi had to deal with nasty people in low level jobs like fast food, but now she knew that she had even nastier people waiting for her when she started working in hospitals. But when had her life ever been easy, so she knew that she would just have to deal with it. 

“That sucks.” She replied. 

They sat there in silence for a few moments. Ms Pieck sipped her coffee, and Gabi tried to calm her nerves. Eventually, Ms Pieck reached over and started rubbing Gabi’s back to help her out. Gabi squealed and tried to pull away since she didn’t like physical contact, but Ms Pieck grabbed her by the shoulder and pulled her closer. 

“Just breathe,” She told Gabi as she continued to rub her back. “Deep breaths, in and out,” 

Gabi started breathing like she told her to, and soon enough found her anxiety lessening. Her nerves were still shot, but at least she could breathe now. 

“So what were you doing in the boys’ dormitory?” Ms Pieck asked. 

“What,” Gabi didn’t know what she meant. 

“I saw you run out of the boys’ dormitory as I was walking to work.” It was then that Gabi noticed the sly look on Ms Pieck’s face. “Were you sleeping over with a boy or something?” 

“No!” Gabi snapped as she pulled away from Ms Pieck’s arms. “I mean, yes I visited a friend last night and I ended up sleeping over, but I wouldn’t do something like that with some guy I barely know.” 

Ms Pieck nodded. “I didn’t think you were that type actually, but you never know. Just out of curiosity, who did you see last night?” 

“Falco, Falco Grice,” Just thinking about him brought a warm feeling to her heart. 

“Ah, well that puts out any chance of what I thought you might have been doing out of my head.” 

“Why?” Gabi raised her eyebrow. Did Ms Pieck think that Falco was gay as well? 

“Because he’s a good Christian boy who probably doesn’t believe in having sex before marriage,” 

“Really,” Falco had never mentioned that he was religious before. Then again, she had never asked. “How do you know?” 

“I asked him once, and he told me.” Okay, now Gabi felt a bit embarrassed, but maybe being Christian wasn’t something about himself that Falco needed to let everybody know. 

“Does that bother you or something?” Ms Pieck asked her. 

“No it doesn’t, my foster family was also religious so I’m used to it. I just didn’t know that little fact about him.” 

“Hmmm,” Ms Pieck took another sip of her coffee. “Do you like him, Falco?” 

“Yeah I do.” Gabi smiled at the image in her mind of Falco’s face covered in flour from his failed attempt to make her breakfast. “He’s a really nice guy isn’t he?” 

“That he is,” Ms Pieck agreed. “He’s in one of my classes. He’s always polite and helpful. Quite a relief from my other students who always behave like spoiled brats. I wish that I had more good Christian boys in my classes.” 

Gabi giggled. A few moments ago she had been bawling her eyes out, now here she was gossiping about boys with Ms Pieck Finger. “Yeah,” She sighed. “He’s great isn’t he?” 

“That he is Gabi that he is.” 

Gabi was starting to feel better now. Her breathing had slowed down to normal letting sweet oxygen into her lungs. Her hands had stopped shaking and she had finally stopped sweating, and now she could feel how cold it was out here. The cold aside, everything was starting to feel better for her thanks to Ms Pieck’s timely intervention. 

“Do you get these often?” She heard Ms Pieck ask. 

“Huh,” 

“Anxiety attacks, do you get them often?” 

“Oh,” Gabi remembered. Ms Pieck was smart. Like Stephen Hawking level smart. One often wondered why she was working in a small little college like this. It was only natural that someone as smart as Ms Pieck would figure out what was bothering her. 

“Not often,” She sheepishly replied. “I mean, not as often as I used to get them. In fact it’s very rare that I have them. This morning was just an exception that’s all. I’m fine now.” 

“Do you want to talk about it?” 

“No, not really,” Gabi shook her head. They sat there in silence for a few moments before Gabi asked. “How did you know I was having an anxiety attack?” 

Ms Pieck sighed and said. “My father used to get them when I was growing up. I guess it was hereditary and he got it from his family, but he also suffered from a crap load of medical problems that only made it worse.” 

“Like what?” Gabi asked. 

Ms Pieck was silent for a moment. Gabi could see the pained look in her eyes like she was remembering something that she didn’t want to remember. She could understand the feeling since there were many things that she wished that she could forget. 

“He had cancer.” Ms Pieck’s voice was quiet as a whisper. Gabi could tell that this was taking a toll on her. “The type of cancer that you don’t recover from; he considered chemo therapy but he was afraid that he would spend all his money on a treatment that would destroy his body and that would leave him bankrupt. He didn’t want to leave me with nothing so he just decided to do nothing about it, but all the constant worrying made his anxiety worsen to the point where he would have an attack every other day.” 

“And you were okay with it, his decision not to have treatment.” 

“Oh of course not,” Ms Pieck said a bit more sternly. “I wanted him to get the treatment even though there was no chance in hell it would work, because if there was even the slightest possibility that he could live, I was willing to take it. He and I fought about it a lot in the first few months after his diagnosis. I would yell at him for being a coward and accuse him of giving up, and then I would storm off to my room to cry on my pillow. I wasn’t really mad at him; I was just scared to lose him since he was the only family I had left. He understood that which why every time I yelled at him he would just sit there calmly and counter me with his own arguments. Afterwards, he would wait for me to calm down, and then he would go up to my room and sit there with me as I cried.” 

M s Pieck paused for a moment to wipe some tears out of her eyes. Gabi had known Ms Pieck ever since she first came to this college, and she had never heard this story or seen her like this. She did realize that she should probably feel honored that Ms Pieck was telling her something like this since this was clearly something that she was very sensitive about. 

“Did he die?” Gabi quietly asked. 

“Of course he did. He died when I was sixteen.” Ms Pieck said with a hint of sadness in her voice. “My mother had died when I was little so I had nowhere to go really. Fortunately Porco’s family was willing to take me in otherwise I don’t know what I would’ve done.”

Gabi understood how that felt. After Reiner died, she hadn’t had any family left to take care of her. All of her mom’s family was gone and the only close relative she had left was her Uncle Jack from Minnesota, but he had made it quite clear that he didn’t want anything to do with her. She vividly remembered the conversation that Sasha had over the phone with him, which ended in Sasha calling him an asshole and slamming the phone down. Sasha was nice, but she could be pretty scary sometimes. 

“My Aunt Karina used to get them too.” Gabi mumbled. 

“Oh yes, that’s right. I saw her have a few when Reiner and I were growing up together. It never bothered me to much since I was used to it with my dad and all, but I could tell that it took a toll on Reiner though.” 

“Yeah,” Gabi remembered how much Auntie Karina’s degenerating mental health had hurt Reiner. He had done his best to help her, but in the end he was forced to commit her to a mental institution. Doing so had devastated him, and she understood why. After all, it had hurt her too. It was hard to watch someone you loved and cared about fade away into a former shadow of themselves. 

“Ms Pieck, how long did you know Reiner?” she asked. 

Ms Pieck looked like she was reminiscing for a moment before she answered. “We went to elementary school together, him me and Pock. There were six of us in those days, Reiner, Bertolt Hoover, Annie Leonhart, Porco, and his brother Marcel, and me. We were kind of a crew back then, always getting into trouble together. We were all friends through junior high until we reached high school when Reiner, Annie, and Bertolt went to a different high school than the Galliards and I. We tried to keep in touch with them, but we ended up drifting as they made new friends in their new school.”

Ms Pieck took another sip of coffee before continuing. “Afterwards, I kept in touch with Reiner through social media. We got together a couple times, but we did so less with each passing year since he and Porco didn’t really get along.” 

“How come,” As far as Gabi knew everyone that knew Reiner had liked him, well, other than that dike Ymir but she didn’t count. 

“It’s a long story,” Ms Pieck sighed. “And I’d rather not get into it right now. All you need to know is that we had a little falling out, and we all stopped seeing each other after a while.” 

This was all news to Gabi who had never heard about this from Reiner or Auntie Karina. She had known that Reiner had been friends with Ms Pieck and the others, but she hadn’t known that they had had a serious falling out. She still couldn’t help but wonder what it was that pushed Reiner’s old group of friends apart. Strangely enough, judging from Ms Pieck’s tone of voice it seemed like it had something to do with Reiner himself. 

Eager to get some answers, Gabi cleared her throat and asked. “Did you like Reiner? I mean, you said that Mr. Galliard didn’t get along with him but did you like him personally?” 

“Oh, yes I did like him. He was a fairly good friend when we were kids. We had disagreements of course, but that was just typical kids stuff. It’s just…” Ms Pieck trailed off. 

“Just what,” Gabi wasn’t sure that she liked where this was going. 

“It’s just that…” Ms Pieck stopped herself before she went any further. The way she spoke made Gabi feel apprehensive; it felt like Ms Pieck was hiding something that she’d rather not tell anyone. But the fact that this secret was about Reiner only made Gabi want to hear it more. 

Ms Pieck shook her head. “I shouldn’t say anything. He was your family and I know that you two loved each other. So you probably shouldn’t hear the reason why we all distanced ourselves from him.” 

“Why, what happened?” 

“It’s nothing, just.” Ms Pieck took a deep breath. “I heard about how he died, you were there when it happened, right?” 

Gabi was tempted to say that the memory of what happened that day still haunted her dreams, but she just nodded instead. 

“Well, let’s just say that the Reiner in that moment was the Reiner that I knew growing up.” 

Gabi didn’t know what she meant by that, but she could feel the gravity of her words. She opened he mouth to say something, but couldn’t find any words to say. 

They were silent for a few moments before Ms Pieck finished off her coffee with one long gulp. Standing up, she brushed off her skirt and said. “Well, it’s almost time for my class to start, so I guess we should get going. Come on, I’ll walk you to class.” She offered her hand to Gabi who took it and allowed Ms Pieck to help her to her feet. 

Once Gabi stood up though, she realized that she had sat down in a snow pile and her rear end was now soaked. She let out an exasperated groan as she walked with Ms Pieck to class. Now she was going to have to spend the entire day feeling extremely uncomfortable due to the fact that her panties were clinging to her ass. 

Class was boring as always. Not even Ms Pieck’s funny nature could make advanced mathematics interesting. Half the time Gabi could barely keep her eyes open. But she tried to pay attention anyway since she really needed the credits this class would give her. She wanted to get into the special internship program that the local hospitals had available to med students, but they would only take the top of the class so she needed to be in at least the top ten percent of her class if she wanted to be selected for the program. 

She had learned at a young age that the only way that she would ever have a high paying professional job was through hard work and determination. So as a result of which, she pushed herself to the limit and put one hundred and ten percent effort into her school work since she really wanted to make a career in the medical field and be the first Braun in history to actually make something of herself and not be some low level minimum wage worker like the rest of her family had been. 

She still found that she couldn’t focus on what Ms Pieck was saying right now since her mind kept wandering back to what had happened this morning. She hadn’t meant to hurt Falco, but when her mind was in that state she tended to lose control over her actions. Falco was probably wondering what the hell had happened to her since she had been fine one moment and crazy the next. Maybe if she went to him, apologized, and explained to him what happened, he would forgive her, but right now she was too ashamed to face him. 

When class ended, Gabi checked her phone and saw that she had ten missed text messages all from Falco. Her thumb hovered over the first one for a moment before she swiped them all away. A part of her wanted to reach out to him, but another part was scared of what he would say. So she simply put her phone away and left for her next class. 

The rest of her classes that day ended at four, right around the time she was supposed to go jogging with Falco. She figured that their plans had been canceled due to her action this morning, but she still couldn’t help but look over at the direction of the city park and wonder if he was there waiting for her. Suddenly her phone buzzed, and when she looked at it she saw that the message was from Falco. 

She bit her lower lip and debated whether or not to respond. If he kept trying to contact her like this, then maybe that meant that he wasn’t that angry at her after all. But going to see him would mean that she would have to explain to him what had happened this morning, and that wasn’t something that she was prepared to do. She liked Falco, but she wasn’t ready to unload all of her personal problems onto him yet. After all, who would want to hang out with some border line crazy person like herself? So she took one last look at Falco’s message, put her phone back in her purse, and started walking home. 

It had gotten colder since this morning forcing Gabi to pull her jacket closer to her body. While that helped keep her body warm, it didn’t stop the wind from nipping at her face. As she walked home, she found herself thinking about her previous conversation with Ms Pieck and she started to wonder what she really knew about Reiner. 

She realized that she never knew who Reiner’s father was since Auntie Karina had him out of wedlock and never mentioned his father to anybody. She knew that he had been a star football player in high school and might have had a shot at playing in college, but an injury he sustained in a car accident ended any chance of that happening, so he went into law enforcement instead. 

After high school, he married his girlfriend Historia, and their marriage went straight to hell after a year. Gabi remembered countless awkward dinners where she would sit there uncomfortably while the two of them would yell at each other for every little thing. The marriage ended when Historia realized that she was actually gay, and left Reiner for that bitch Ymir.

Reiner started to deteriorate after that. He became sad, depressed, and moody all the time. Gabi had done her best to cheer him up, but he rebuffed all her efforts to do so. He eventually alienated all his friends, and anyone else who would have helped him. Sasha had tried to help him, but he pushed her away as well. By the time he died, the only person he had left in this world was his little cousin, and he repaid her love by hurting her more than he could ever know. 

Despite everything that happened, Gabi still loved Reiner. Yes he hadn’t been particularly good to her in the end, but throughout most of her life he had always been there for her as a big brother and confidant giving her love and security when few others would have. So despite his last selfish act ruining most of her memories of him, he still held a special place in her heart. 

It was starting to get dark out as she made her way home. The setting sun turned the campus grounds around her into a pretty shade of orange making the area look like something you would see on some sappy commercial trying to get you to buy their product by using beautiful imagery to pull at your heart strings. Gabi didn’t notice though, for some reason she felt an anxious desire to get home as fast as she could. 

For the last few minutes, Gabi had been feeling like she was being watched by someone or something. She had no rational reason to think this since the campus grounds were entirely empty, but for some reason she kept looking over her shoulder trying to find whatever it was she thought was following her. As she looked around, she started to realize that she was all alone; there was no one around her making her vulnerable to the Devils if they were to come after her. Now it hit her, the Devils had actually come after her this morning like she had initially thought; they had just been waiting for her to be alone like this before they made their move. 

Upon realizing this, Gabi bolted and ran as fast as she could to try to get home before the Devils caught her. She was scared now, her body trembled, her forehead started sweating, and her heart started beating tenfold. She couldn’t let them get her; she couldn’t let them take her away like they did Auntie Karina. She didn’t want to spend the rest of her life locked up in a mental asylum mumbling to herself while she painted strange paintings of horrible, terrible things that she saw in her dreams like Auntie Karina did now. 

Gabi didn’t stop running until she reached her apartment building. Once inside, she ran to the elevator and starting continuously pressing the up button desperate to get to her room. She kept looking over her shoulder for any sign of the Devils following her. She didn’t see them, but she knew that they weren’t far behind. She couldn’t see them, but she could feel them just like in her nightmare this morning. They were coming for her, just like they had come for all her family. When the elevator opened up, she jumped inside and quickly pressed the button to her floor to get the hell out of here. 

Only when the doors closed and the elevator started moving did her panting subside. As her body calmed itself, she realized that she had had another anxiety attack just now. “Damn it,” She mumbled as tears started clouding her eyes. “There are no Devils. It’s all in your head. It’s all in your fucking head.” She was going to be one of them wasn’t she, just another member of the Braun family who went crazy or came to a bad end like every Braun in history.

Zophia was home when she opened the door to her tiny apartment. Zophia was sitting on the couch going over some schoolwork when she looked up to see her best friend come home. 

“Hey, how was your day?” Zophia greeted. “Mine was pretty good thanks for asking.” 

Gabi ignored her roommate and made her way into their shared bedroom. She threw her backpack on her bed, kicked off her shoes, and started looking underneath Zophia’s bed for a certain package. 

Zophia peaked into their room curious as to what she was looking for. “Um, Gabi,” She called out. “What are you looking for?” 

“Where’s the stuff at?” Gabi bluntly replied. 

“The stuff…oh yeah, right,” Zophia remembered what she was talking about. She walked over to her dresser and pulled out a little cookie bin. Gabi snatched it from her and opened it up to view its contents. Inside was the marijuana that Zophia had bought earlier. 

“I’m getting high tonight.” She dryly told her friend. 

“What’s the occasion?” Zophia asked. 

“Nothing,” Gabi took out a glass pipe out of her desk drawer and started filling it with weed. “I just need to be not here for a few hours.” 

Gabi could tell that Zophia knew something was wrong by the look she was giving her. Clearing her throat, Zophia asked. “Gabi is something wrong. Did you have another episode? If you did, do you want me to call Sasha or her parents, because I’m sure that they would want to help.” 

“No!” Gabi snapped harder than she intended. “Don’t call anyone, please.” She didn’t want Sasha or her parents to know that this was happening to her again, because if they did they would freak out and she didn’t want them worrying about her. 

“Well, you can talk to me if you want to.” Zophia put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. 

Gabi pulled away and said. “I’m fine, thank you.” 

“Gabi, please just…” 

“Zophia,” Gabi snapped. “Please just leave me alone right now, okay. I’ve had a long couple of days, and I just want to relax for one second with out everybody asking me if I’m going crazy or not.” 

Zophia took a step back, and Gabi could see the hurt in her eyes. All of a sudden she felt guilty. Zophia was just trying to help her, and her she was acting like a bitch to her best friend. 

“Okay,” Zophia said understandingly. “Just let me know if you need anything.” And with that, she left and closed the door behind her leaving Gabi completely alone with her demons. 

Sighing, Gabi sat down on her bed, pulled out her phone, and started going through her play list. She liked to listen to music while she was high. She found it rather relaxing. She scrolled down until she found the album she was looking for, the same Disturbed album she had shown Falco yesterday. From there she selected her favorite song in the world. Disturbed’s cover of ‘The Sound of Silence’. She loved this song more than any song in the world. The sadness and beauty of it appealed to her making her feel sad yet hopeful every time she listened to it. It was just what she needed right now. 

Sticking her ear buds in her ears, she took a lighter, lit it under her pipe, and took a long, hard drag from it. She felt instant relief as the weed coursed through her body. It felt like she could relax for the first time in days. Hitting the play button on her phone, her favorite song started playing. She lay back on her bed and breathed a sigh of relief as her high hit her. 

She felt safe for now, but she knew that it wouldn’t last. Once she was asleep the nightmares would come to torment her again. And she knew that soon she would have to confront Falco about her actions this morning. She wasn’t sure which she was dreading more.


	13. In Which Falco Helps some one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well I'm back again with a new chapter. Once again, I had to rewrite this like four times before I was satisfied with it. I'm still not entirely satisfied with it, but it's passable so to hell with it.
> 
> As for what's going on with the Manga, Falco's titan form looked awesome. And let's not forget that best girl Gabi got the kill shot on our favorite piece of shit Floch, who unless he has some secret Ackermann genes I don't no about, is totally dead. Sucks about Magath though, he was one of my favorite characters.
> 
> By the way, to Aoisakibara I'd like to say that if you do make fan art of my story, please leave a link to it or at least tell me where I can find it because I'd really like to see it. 
> 
> Stay tuned for more notes at the end where I have a special announcement to make.

It was cold out in Liberio’s city park today. The temperature was supposed to drop to below freezing tonight, and the fact that the sun was setting didn’t help either. Most sensible people were hiding in there homes where they could turn on the heat and wrap them selves in blankets while they watched their favorite shows. But not Falco, he was sitting out here on one of the park benches in the cold while the icy breeze nipped at his face. Normally he wouldn’t dream of going jogging in this weather, but Udo had once mentioned that Gabi was totally into exercising in extreme conditions. So this morning he had asked her to come jogging with him this evening hoping that it would impress her. 

He had been waiting for Gabi to show up for about half an hour now with still no sign of her anywhere. He checked his phone for what was probably the hundredth time since he got off class hoping to see if she had replied to any of his messages. He sighed in disappointment when he saw that she still hadn’t, but he wasn’t surprised given what had happened at breakfast this morning. 

It still really confused him. One minute he and Gabi had been eating breakfast and having a good time together, the next she suddenly tried to run out on him for whatever reason. When he tried to ask her what was wrong, she had shoved him on the floor and ran out before he could say anything. After she left, he had just laid there on the floor looking up at the ceiling trying to make sense of what happened. After twenty minutes of thinking and still no answers coming to mind, he decided to try to call her to see if she wanted to talk about what had happened. She never did respond to any of his calls. 

When he had got off class, he had decided to come here anyway in case she still decided to show up despite what happened. He hadn’t really expected her to come, but he still waited because he really wanted an explanation for what happened to her this morning. He knew that it wasn’t normal for a person to be fine one moment and freaking out for no reason the next. That’s why he was desperately trying to contact her. Gabi was his friend, and Falco liked to think that he looked after his friends. So if one of his friends was having problems, he was going to try to help that friend as much as possible. 

It was really concerning seeing Gabi act the way she had. Her hands had been trembling, her body had been sweating really badly, and it looked like she had been having trouble breathing. It still perplexed him to see her act so unusually. To him Gabi had always seemed like a genuinely happy person whose life was mostly worry free; well, except for what she had told him about her parents, but it didn’t seem to affect her that much, at least, not on the surface anyway. 

Falco groaned and rubbed is hands against his temples. This was the problem with him. He always just assumed that everyone lived happy, perfect lives and only worried about the basic day to day stuff, even though he knew that his assumption couldn’t be farther from the truth. Truthfully, he knew that most people led very sad, depressing lives and had many personal problems that plagued them throughout the day. He had discovered this at a young age, and the very thought still made him sad since he wanted everybody to be happy even though he knew that it was impossible for that to be real. 

And the fact that he now knew that Gabi was probably one of those types of people was why he was so depressed right now. Seeing her smiling face made him happier than anything ever had in his life. Whenever he was around her, it felt like all the fears and doubts he carried inside him just melted away like nothing else mattered except seeing that cute smile of hers. So therefore, when he saw her acting all upset likes she had been, it made him feel sad that this sweet, happy person was secretly harboring some sort of horrible pain inside her. 

Not for the first time, he considered going over to her apartment to see if she was there. Sure she could ignore his calls, but if he went to her in person then she would have to talk to him, right? Or maybe she would just slam the door in his face and tell him to leave her alone again. Truth being told, Falco wasn’t sure if he could handle that kind of rejection from a friend again. 

He had just wanted to help her, why didn’t she understand that? And what was it that had set her off at breakfast? He assumed that whatever this was must come from what happened to her parents. After all, if he had lost his parents at a young age he would probably have all sorts of issues too. But that didn’t mean that she had to conceal her feeling from him. He knew that whatever it was she was hiding must be hard, but surely she must know that if she told him what it was that he would understand whatever it was she was going through. 

But then again, maybe he should just keep his distance for now. All Gabi had done today was make it clear that she didn’t want to talk to him, so maybe it was for the best that he leave her alone right now. Yes, he would just respect her privacy and let her figure this out on her own. After all, if she didn’t want to talk then who was he to object to her wishes? Perhaps this would be for the best. If she wanted to talk to him then that would be fine, if not, then maybe he should just go back to the way things were before he met Gabi. Sure his life had been a little boring, but at least he didn’t have to go through all this emotional crap he was feeling right now. Yes, that was what he would do, and he would be happier because of it. 

It started to snow a little as Falco made his way back home. Tiny, white snowflakes stung his cheeks and dampened his blond hair as he slowly walked through the mostly empty streets of Liberio. He didn’t notice the cold really. The snow made him think about that night he and Gabi had spent on the roof during Halloween. He grinned a little when he thought about how pretty she had looked with all the little white snowflakes caught in her raven colored hair as she basked in the light snowfall. He hadn’t realized how beautiful she really was until he had seen her standing there beneath the pale moonlight as the snow fell all around them. While he hadn’t really liked the party, he could honestly say that he had truly enjoyed seeing her that night. 

In order to make his way back to campus, Falco had to pass by the local veteran’s hospital that happened to be located close to the university. As he walked past the hospital, he noticed that there was a large bus offloading a large amount of new patients into the hospital. His heart sank when he saw the condition of the people that he assumed were former veterans. A long line of worn out, beaten down army veterans stretched out from the bus into the hospital where a long and difficult recovery awaited them. Many of them were missing limbs and had to hobble around on crutches pulling at Falco’s heartstrings even further. 

Curious to find out what had happened to these people, Falco went to the scowling orderly who was guiding them into the hospital to see if he knew anything. Upon reaching the orderly, Falco could tell that he wasn’t very happy with his job if the look on his face was any indicator. 

“Excuse me sir,” He quietly asked. “What happened to all these people?” 

“The hell if I know kid.” The orderly shrugged. “These assholes get deployed in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, and then when they get shot up like this they get dumped here where no one can see them only so that they could keep me up all night with their screaming.” 

“So, they have PTSD.” 

“That they do kid. That’s what happens when you spend too much time digging trenches. You live long enough with bombs and bullets whizzing by like KABOOM.”

The sudden outburst caused one of the veterans to scream and fall back knocking down a long haired man who had to walk on crutches. To Falco’s disgust, the orderly seemed to think that it was the funniest thing he had ever seen and started laughing his ass off. If Falco were a more violent person, he would have punched him in the face to make him stop laughing at these men’s misfortune. 

As the other orderlies came to take the screaming man away, Falco decided to help up the long haired man who he know saw was missing a leg and an eye. “Here,” Falco said as he helped the man back to his feet (or foot he should say). “I’m sorry about that guy. He seems like a total asshole, treating a sick man like that. Someone should probably report him to his supervisor or somebody higher up, because no one should treat somebody who got injured serving his country like that.”

Falco helped the injured man pick up his crutches and helped him inside the hospital where a team of nurses came to take care of him. Before he left, Falco turned to the man he had just helped and said. “Thank you for your service by the way. I know you had a hard time over there, but I’m sure you’ll get better. You don’t have to fight any more.” 

When Falco finally reached his dorm complex, he was about to go inside when all of a sudden his phone started ringing. He quickly pulled it out desperate to see if it was Gabi finally returning his calls, only to feel his heart sink when he saw that it was Zophia’s number instead. “Hello,” He answered, curious to see what his friend’s girlfriend wanted to talk to him about. 

“Hey Falco, it’s me.” She said. 

“Hey Zoph, what’s up?” 

“I’m calling about Gabi. Did something happen this morning, because she came home tonight acting really upset about something. So I was just wondering if you knew what was going on.” 

Falco felt a pit in my stomach; so even Gabi’s best friend could see that something was wrong, if that was the case then maybe that meant that something very serious was going on with her. 

“Is she all right?” He nervously asked. 

“Yes, no, I really don’t know Falco.” He heard Zophia sigh through the phone. “I’ve seen her like this before, all right, and I’m just getting really worried.” 

Falco considered his options. He had previously just decided to leave Gabi alone for the time being to let her work whatever this was out. But know Gabi’s best friend was reaching out to him for help meaning that something must really be wrong with Gabi. What should he do? Should he reach out to Gabi to figure out what had happened at breakfast, or should he do what his more introverted nature told him to do and stay away. 

After a few seconds, he made his decision. “Hang on Zophia, I’ll be right there.” 

Five minutes later, Zophia let him into her apartment. 

“So where is she?” Falco asked. 

“She’s in our bedroom.” Zophia pointed to the door down the hallway. “She’s been in there for over an hour and she hasn’t come out yet.” 

“Okay, I just need to talk to her real quick.” 

“Um Falco,” Zophia stopped him before he could move towards the door. “I just think I should warn you, she’s probably high right now.” 

Strange, he hadn’t taken Gabi for a stoner. He nodded and went to make sure his friend was all right.

When he reached the door, he knocked on the door and called out. “Gabi it’s me. I’m not here to talk about what happened this morning I just wanted to see if you were all right.” 

No answer, he was about to knock again when suddenly the door swung open to reveal a somewhat unleveled Gabi. He suddenly felt very uncomfortable at the sight of her. Her hair was much more messy than usual with her bangs spilling freely over her forehead. Her clothes were wrinkly and uneven like she had been sleeping when he knocked. She wasn’t wearing any shoes or socks so she had walked to the door barefoot. Falco noted that she had very cute toes. And the weirdest thing was how she smelled. Falco had never smelled marijuana before, but it was definitely the only thing it could be. 

“Hey Gabi” He sheepishly mumbled. 

Gabi stared at him blankly for a moment before she slurred out. “Heyyyy Falco. What’s up?” 

“Um, look, Zophia called me and said that she was worried about you, so I just came by to see if you were all right.” 

“Your name is so weird you know that.” Gabi said as she leaned closer to his face. 

“Um, yeah I know it is.” Falco was forced to take a few steps back to avoid her. “Gabi seriously, are you all right? First breakfast and now this, I don’t know what’s going on, but Zophia and I are here if you need to talk about it.” 

“Oh I’m fine... Fine,” Gabi slurred as she started to sway back and forth. “God Falco, you worry to much you know that.”

“I just…” 

“But that’s okay,” She cut him off. “Because that’s just who you are, a kind, caring person who only thinks of others.” 

“Well thank you I…”

“Unlike me,” Gabi started to sniffle “I’m not as nice as you. If something like this happened to someone I just met, I would probably just never speak to them again because I’m kind of a piece of shit when you think about it.” 

“Whoa Gabi, that’s not true. You’re not perfect but you’re not a bad person or anything.” 

Gabi chuckled and shook her head, clearly still lightheaded from the weed. “Oh Falco, you wouldn’t say that if you really knew me.” 

“Gabi, what are you talking about?” 

“Oh haven’t you seen my Facebook page, oh wait you haven’t because I took it down years ago, oh well. Well if you were to look at my old Facebook page, then you would see what everyone has to say about me.” 

“What things?” 

“Oh you know,” Gabi shrugged. “That I’m a psychotic little bitch from hell that deserves to die, that I’m full of myself, that I’m annoying, That I should be locked up in a room and get repeatedly raped because of an accident I had years ago in which I hurt someone.” 

“Jesus Christ Gabi,” Falco knew that people could be cruel, but he never thought that anybody could be this horrible. “People say that about you.”

“Not anymore, not since high school,” 

Falco took a deep breath. God, he didn’t understand how people could be so horrible to other people. Clearly this was something that bothered Gabi greatly, but he knew that now wasn’t the time to address it. Maybe he would talk to her about it later when she wasn’t high. 

“Gabi, I just came to see if you were all right, okay. So, are you all right?” 

“Yup,” She nodded. 

“There’s nothing you want to talk about.” 

“Nope,” She shook her head. 

Falco felt at a loss. He wanted to help her, but she wasn’t letting him in. He never knew what to do in these situations. Sure he wanted to help, but how could he help someone who didn’t want to be helped. He sighed when he realized that truthfully, there was nothing he could do right now. “Okay then, I was just checking on you. I’ll just leave right now.” He said with a bit of defeat in his voice. 

“Cool,” And with that, Gabi shut her door leaving Falco feeling extremely saddened that she didn’t trust him enough to open up to him yet. 

Great, she didn’t want to talk to him. He should’ve known better. If she had really wanted to talk she would’ve called him. Maybe…Maybe he had been too nosy. After all, if Gabi wanted her privacy respected then he should probably respect her wish. 

Falco was about to turn and leave when all of a sudden the bedroom door burst open and Gabi came jumping out. Before Falco could say anything, Gabi tackled him into a great big hug. Falco yelped as the force of her hug made him fall over taking her down with him. And for the second time today, Gabi knocked him on his ass.

Falco looked up to see Zophia sticking her head in the hallway to see what all the commotion was. “What the hell!” She exclaimed. 

“Fuck off Zophia.” Gabi snapped. I’m trying to talk to Falco.

Zophia gave the two of them a puzzled expression before she shrugged and turned away. After she left, Gabi turned her attention back to a now confused Falco.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, oh my God Falco, I’m so fucking sorry.” Gabi wailed. “I didn’t mean to shove you this morning, I just didn’t want you to see me like that and I panicked.”

“It’s okay Gabi” Falco grunted at the weight on his chest. “I don’t care about that; I just want to know what happened.” 

Gabi sat up off his chest, though she still remained seated on his lap. She wiped some tears out of her eyes and explained. “I never wanted to tell you because I was afraid that you would think I was some freak, but I have anxiety.” 

Anxiety, if you asked Falco what was the first thing he thought of when he thought of Gabi, anxiety ridden wouldn’t be it. She always seemed so upbeat and confident like nothing ever bothered her, but was it possible that that was just a front that she put on for other people. “Gabi, what do you mean?” He asked.

“I um,” Gabi sniffled. ”I had a panic attack when we were having breakfast. That’s why I tried to leave. When you touched me I panicked and lashed out, that’s all. Falco, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just…I just… I don’t know. I totally understand if you don’t want to be my friend anymore, but please know that I am so sorry for what happened.” 

“Gabi, its okay, I understand.” Falco reassured her. 

“You do.” 

“Of course I do, Gabi. It’s not your fault, after all hundreds of people suffer from anxiety. Believe it or not, Udo gets panic attacks from time to time.” 

“He does?” 

“Yeah, as long as I’ve known him, now that I think about it, I really should’ve seen the symptoms in you when it happened.” 

“I’m so sorry. I really am.” 

“Don’t be,” Falco sat up and put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “Gabi, you don’t have to worry about me judging you. You’re not perfect, but I’m still your friend and if there’s something wrong with you, I going to want to help you no matter what.” 

Gabi just stared blankly at him for a few moments before she smiled and wrapped him in a big hug which he hesitantly returned. They stayed there for a few moments, wrapped up in each others arms, swaying side by side, but then Falco said. “Um Gabi, could you get off me now. My leg is starting to go numb.” 

“Oh, sorry,” Gabi stood up as quickly as she could, though she stepped on Falco’s shin as she got up making him wince in pain. Once they were both up, they looked around nervously for a while as they tried to figure out what to say. Gabi broke the tension by saying. “Well I’m going to go to bed now, alright.” 

“Yeah, I should probably get going to. I guess I’ll see you around then. ”

“Yeah, that’d be great.” 

“All right, I’ll see you later then.” 

“Hey Falco,” Gabi called out. 

“Yeah,” 

“Thank you for stopping by and letting me apologize to you. It really meant a lot to me.” 

“Of course, any time,” 

Gabi smiled and gave him one last hug before she closed her bedroom door leaving Falco alone with his thoughts. 

Falco found Zophia sitting in the living room waiting for him when he emerged from the hallway. “How is she,” She asked. 

“I think she’s going to be fine now.” He replied. 

“Thank God, because I was getting really worried there.” 

“Yeah,” Falco agreed. “Zophia, what is this all about? Gabi told me about her anxiety and the fact that she had panic attacks, but what causes them?”

Zophia sighed. “Well you see…” She trailed off. “I’m not sure how much Gabi would want me to tell you, and it’s probably best that I don’t tell you since Gabi probably wouldn’t feel comfortable with you knowing what I know.” 

“And what do you know?” Falco was now very curious to know what horrible secrets Gabi was hiding. 

“In all honesty, not everything, there was a period in between age’s eight to twelve where we didn’t see each other after I moved away to another town. Eventually, Gabi moved to that town and we reconnected, but the Gabi that moved to Dauper was extremely different from the one I had known when I was little. I don’t know exactly what happened when we were apart, just the bits and pieces that she’s told me over the years, plus the little tidbits I’ve been able to get from her foster family; but a lot of horrible things happened to her in that timeframe that she’s never really recovered from. But I do no this, she had a pretty fucked up childhood. Think about it, your life begins with your parents dying in a car accident taking your unborn brother with you, I’d say your going to be screwed up for life.” 

“It must have been hard watching your friend go through all that.” Falco said. 

“You have no idea.” Zophia sighed. “That’s why I called you. She’s come so far in these past few years; I’d hate to see her relapse back into that horrible place she was back in high school.” 

Falco found a new sense of admiration for Zophia. It must’ve been difficult dealing with a friend who had so many issues like Gabi had, but she had stuck with Gabi through thick and thin no matter what happened between them. That new sense of admiration also applied to Gabi as well. To overcome all those odds to become the person she was now, it must’ve taken a lot of strength and determination which she seemed to have in abundance. 

“Well she’s a tough person. I’m sure she’ll be fine now.” He said. 

“I hope so.” From her tone of voice, Falco could tell that Zophia wasn’t as sure of that as he was. 

“I’m going to head out now unless you need anything else.” He said.

“Yeah, that’s fine. Hey Falco,” 

“Yeah,” Falco said before he was about to walk out the door. 

“Thank you for stopping by, Gabi’s lucky to have a friend like you. We all are.” 

Falco simply nodded at his friend’s compliment and left closing the door behind him. As he walked down the hallway of the girls’ dorm complex, he found himself thinking about Gabi. He didn’t know what underlining issues Gabi had going on inside of her, but he figured that Gabi would tell him all about it when she was ready. Until then, he would just continue to be her friend and occasionally offer her whatever support she needed. After all, sometimes you can’t make it through life on your own. Sometimes you needed someone to help you, and that was something Falco would always do for those who needed it no matter who they were or how screwed they were. Because that was just who he was, and he hoped that Gabi would soon recognize that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When in doubt, borrow dialogue from the manga am I right. Anyway, what I'd like to say is that I want to thank you all for supporting this. I have just realized that I have been working on this for over a year now with only thirteen chapters published.
> 
> With that being said, I've realized that I need a break from writing to relax and clear my head. Famous last words right, don't worry, I will never abandon this story. As for my special announcement, I do intend to return with a new chapter sometime in August alongside a new Annie/Armin story I have planned. I don't have a title for it yet, but just keep an eye out for a Annie/Armin story with my name on it. It will probably be better written than this since I kind of know what I'm doing now. 
> 
> Please comment and leave kudos, thank you all so much, and until next time, later.

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave you're comments below as I'm interested in what you all think of this. I'm also curious as to how much Gabi hate I'm going to get for this.


End file.
